Local Inclusionary Housing Programs: Meeting Housing Needs

Abstract:     
This article explores the expansive legal authority that local governments in many states have to meet housing needs directly by providing for the production of new affordable homes. There is not a great deal of scholarship on the subject as we approach it. The emphasis in the academic literature in the field of affordable housing is on top-down, systemic, or theoretical solutions: urging reforms in federal and state finance programs, imploring courts to penalize localities that engage in exclusionary zoning, describing in detail a variety of inclusionary zoning techniques, or explaining relevant theories or the economics of the issue of affordable housing. Our topic focuses instead on what individual municipalities can do to bridge the widening gap between income and housing costs.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 24

Accepted Paper Series