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Abstract:
This chapter is part of "The Legal Guide to Affordable Housing Development", a practical guidebook covering most important areas of law that apply to affordable housing development. This chapter analyzes a wide variety of state and local regulation affecting the development of several types of affordable housing which are neither traditional single family nor multi-family. Specifically, the chapter discusses statutes, ordinances, regulations and leading case law concerning the siting of manufactured housing (Section II), farmworker housing (Section III), accessory or secondary units (Section IV), single room occupancy hotels (SROs) (Section V), condominium conversion regulation (Section VI), and emergency shelters and transitional housing, including domestic violence shelters (Section VII).

affordable housing, state and local regulation, housing development, single family, multi-family, manufactured housing, farmworker housing, single room occupancy hotels (SROs), condominium conversion, emergency shelters, transitional housing, domestic violence shelters

Abstract:
Building on recent scholarship, this Article explores the five housing ethics that have historically shaped U.S. housing law and policy: (1) housing as an economic good, (2) housing as home, (3) housing as a human right, (4) housing as providing social order, and (5) housing as one land use in a functional system. The housing ethic framework brings all of America's housing law and policy under one conceptual roof. The Article argues that each of these housing ethics is deeply embedded in American housing policy and law, and that none has ever achieved a complete hegemony, i.e., that coexistence and pluralism among the housing ethics is the norm. The Article examines the challenges and opportunities that our housing ethic pluralism presents to the affordable housing movement. It identifies the housing as one land use in a functional system ethic as the single most promising ethic to advance affordability.

housing, legal right, ethics, discrimination, planning, policy, affordability, social norms

Abstract:
The development of affordable housing and services for low and moderate income households has been plagued by local opposition (commonly referred to as the not-in-my-back-yard or NIMBY syndrome) for decades. Many affordable housing developers view local opposition is the most important barrier to development after insufficient subsidy. A hardening of racial and economic attitudes and increasing opposition to growth and development of all kinds suggest that local opposition is likely to remain and even get worse. Based upon the experience of two successful multi-year regional projects to confront local opposition in the San Francisco Bay Area, this article proposes a novel approach to local opposition called Managing Local Opposition (MLO) that combines proactive planning by the developer with legal strategies, community organizing and public relations strategies.

housing, affordable housing, NIMBY, discrimination, legal strategies, managing local opposition, development, land use, low income, community development, growth, planning, zoning, race, class, community organizing, public relations, media relations

Abstract:
This article argues that a deceptively simple "exemption" to the 1988 Fair Housing Act Amendments (FHAA) for "reasonable" governmental occupancy standards has been misinterpreted by numerous courts, particularly by the Sixth Circuit in Affordable Housing Advocates v. City of Richmond Heights, 209 F.3d 626 (6th Cir. 2000). This misinterpretation undercuts the protection from housing discrimination that the FHAA provides for families, especially families of color. This article sorts through the confusion about the "exemption," provides a step-by-step analysis for courts' application of the exemption, and offers two plausible versions of a "reasonable" standard.

racial discrimination, economic discrimination, housing, affordable housing, low income housing, housing policy, race, federal fair housing act, federal housing act amendments, FHA, FHAA, residential occupany standard, residential occupancy restriction, housing policy, overcrowding, familial status

Abstract:
While affordable housing has been produced through a variety of public-private partnerships (PPPs) for many decades, this fact is garnering new and increasing attention by legal and policy analysts. This chapter considers how this new attention may affect the future of America's affordable housing movement through the lens of our pluralist housing ethics: (1) Housing as an Economic Good, (2) Housing as Home, (3) Housing as a Human Right, (4) Housing as Providing Social Order, and (5) Housing as One Land Use in a Functional System. (The housing ethics framework was first explicated in Tim Iglesias, Our Pluralist Housing Ethics and the Struggle for Affordable Housing, 42 Wake Forest L. Rev. 511 (2007).) After defining a housing ethic, this chapter briefly explains our five housing ethics and reflects on our housing ethics pluralism. Then, after analyzing the PPP phenomenon using this framework, the chapter concludes that development of affordable housing through the form of PPPs presents important and even historic opportunities for affordable housing development but also substantial risks. Specifically, the proliferation of affordable housing PPPs could engender increased subsidies, continued experimentation with creative methods of developing affordable housing, improved public perceptions of affordable housing, and, most importantly, a fundamental repositioning of affordable housing in legal and policy debates. However, this phenomenon could also lead to the opposite outcomes.

affordable housing, public-private partnerships, housing ethics

Abstract:
This article introduces the housing paradigm perspective, a relatively new field of housing theory and comparative housing studies. The housing paradigm perspective identifies housing paradigms and uses them as tools for understanding and analyzing housing law and policy. Housing paradigms are value-laden organizing principles that shape the whole range of housing issues (viz. financing, production, location, and the use of housing) at all levels of government through an ongoing social dialogue. The primary U.S. housing paradigms are: (1) Housing as an Economic Good, (2) Housing as Home, (3) Housing as a Human Right, (4) Housing as Providing Social Order, and (5) Housing as One Land Use in a Functional System. (In a previous article, Our Pluralist Housing Ethics and the Struggle for Affordability, 42 Wake Forest L. Rev. 511 (2007), the author labeled the paradigms as "housing ethics.") This article explains that heterogeneity or pluralism among housing paradigms is to be expected because of human housing's multi-dimensionality. This article analyzes several dimensions of such pluralism, including global variety and local variety as well as both static and dynamic pluralism. Finally, this article explains some of the consequences of housing paradigm pluralism and identifies critical conceptual, methodological and empirical issues in the field.

housing theory, comparative housing law, housing law

Abstract:
America's housing crisis is serious, pervasive and chronic. It burdens people of color and low-income households most severely, but is now recognized to hinder millions of moderate-income households and full-time workers in mainstream occupations. Past and current housing policies have not solved our chronic housing crisis. This article seeks to open up states' housing policy to new possibilities through the application of a regulatory regime that helped turn around America's environmental policies.

The fundamental problem underlying our housing crisis is the failure of local governments to consistently integrate housing concerns into the full range of land use policies and decisions that actually affect housing. A Housing Impact Assessment (HIA) requirement modeled on the well-known Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) first required by the National Environmental Protection Act would address this problem in an effective way. And a HIA requirement would enable states to steer local governments' exercise of discretion toward the fulfillment of state housing goals while respecting the appropriate autonomy of local governments. The article sets impact assessment strategies into a theoretical context and specifies the elements of a model statute. After considering the potential benefits, costs and risks of this regulatory strategy, the article recommends that each state should adopt an HIA meeting the criteria set out in the article and tailored to its particular situation.

housing, affordable housing, land use, environmental law, impact statements, state housing law, discrimination, NEPA, CEQA, SEPA, HIA, regulation, affordable housing, low-income housing, reflexive law, housing policy, local government