DUPAGE UNITED
Naperville's affordable Housing Crisis, and Proven Solutions Being Implemented Around The Country
I. Introduction and Definitions
A. What Affordable Housing Is
1. IS "Housing for which the
occupant is paying no more than 30% of his or her income
for gross housing costs, including utilities" (US Dept of
Housing and Urban Development definition)
2. IS housing designed, and even mandated by local
ordinance as necessary, to blend in with "market value"
housing in the surrounding community
3. IS a hand up, a private-public partnership
designed to provide in perpetuity for housing that is
affordable for seniors and the middle income workers in the
community
4. IS a keystone of responsible growth and
development, which insures the social and economic
diversity of the community, and provides at least a partial
and substantial answer to traffic congestion and related
pollution issues facing many communities, including
Naperville
5. IS essential to providing secure environments in
which to raise children
6. IS an important element of employers in the
community (including the city itself) being able to recruit
and retain employees
B. What "Affordable Housing" Is NOT (When Educated and Well-Intentioned People are Discussing the Issue):
1. NOT high-rise, people
"warehouses" for the severely impoverished (a la Cabrini
Green and other Chicago Housing Authority structures doomed
to failure)
2. NOT a hand out
3. NOT anti-growth
4. NOT anti-development
5. NOT an eysore
6. NOT, according to numerous studies, a drag on the
pace, or price, of sales of neighboring homes
II. The Statistics
A. According to US Census Data and the
Multiple Listing Service the median home price in
Naperville increased 42% between 2000 and 2005
B. In that same time period, Per capita income rose 8%
C. 34% of Naperville households were paying in excess of
40% of their income for rent in 2000
D. 20% of homeowners were paying too much for housing in
the same year
E. 54% of Naperville households earning under $50,000 pay
more than 30% on housing costs
F. Given the trends noted in A. and B. those statistics
have undoubtedly worsened - Indeed according to Chicago
Metropolis 2020 "In Naperville, for example, a high
proportion of new single family homes are affordable only
to workers with a household income of $80,000 while a high
proportion of jobs created in Naperville in the 1990s paid
$30,000 or less"
G. County-wide, since 1970 DuPage has seen a 478% increase
in the number of commuters coming into DuPage to work,
higher than any of the other 5 counties in the region,
including Cook
H. Today almost half of the commuters working in DuPage
County come from somewhere else in the region
I. This mismatch of the location of jobs and housing those
job-holders can afford contributes to traffic congestion
and air pollution that costs the Chicago region over $4
Billion per year in wasted fuel, delayed shipments, and
lost work time
J. The Affordable Housing Planning and Appeal Act (Public
Acts 93-0595, 93-0678, and 94-0303) required 49
municipalities in the state having less than 10% affordable
housing stock (including Naperville) to approve local
Affordable Housing Plans by April 1, 2005
K. In Money Magazine's ranking of "Best Places to
Live" in 2006, five of the Top Ten, including Fort Collins,
CO (which was ranked Number 1 ), have housing Commissions
L. DuPage County government is facing a $45 million deficit
for 2008 and is already mandating cuts in Human Services of
$750,000 annually. Any hope for increased help on the
affordable housing front from the county therefore seems
remote
III. Solutions That Have Been Deployed Successfully Elsewhere include:
A. Developer Incentives to Inclusionary
Housing - Fee waivers, density bonuses, expedited
permitting, flexible zoning, relaxed code requirements (lot
size, etc.), tax credits to developers reserving a
percentage of new developments for in perpetuity affordable
units
B. Affordable Housing Trust Funds -
There are over 400 affordable housing trust funds across
the country (city, county, state) with a variety of
dedicated funding streams (e.g. tear-down/demolition taxes,
real estate transfer tax, impact fees, TIF, etc.)
C. Community Land Trusts (CLTS) - Land
is held permanently by the private non-profit created to
acquire and hold land for the benefit of a community. The
home is owned by the homeowner who can only sell back to
the CLT or another lower income household, for an
affordable price ("Partial equity")
IV. Examples of Area Communities That have Deployed One or More Affordable Housing
A. Arlington Heights
B. Evanston
C. Highland Park
D. Lake Forest
E. St. Charles
V. Possible First Steps for the City of Naperville
A. Pass a City Council resolution
recognizing that addressing the issue of Affordable Housing
needs to be a high priority for the City of Naperville
because, in its own best interest, addressing the
affordable housing issue is a matter of growth, good
development, and human resource preservation for the City
as well as for the employers that reside here
B. Extend the mandate of the Naperville Fair Housing
Advisory Commission, or form an independent Housing
Commission, to explore the various tried and true
methodologies that other municipalities in the Chicago area
and elsewhere (Boston, etc.) have employed to increase the
amount of affordable housing in their locales
C. Create a separate office of Housing Planning (or create
the responsibilities within an existing office) within the
city government to work together with a Housing Commission
and to work directly with real estate developers and others
toward increasing the amount of affordable housing stock
within Naperville as well as continuing education of the
populace concerning the benefits to be obtained
therefrom