Housing Commission

2/22/2021 - Minutes I. Call to Order Members Present: Robert Millar, Jessica Bridge, Leslie Black-Plumeau, Katherine “Deac” Decarreau City Staff Present: Heather Carrington Guests Present: Councilor Jim Duncan, James McCormick, Sam Myers Call to Order by: Robert Millar Meeting Start Time: 6:04 PM Minutes Recorded by: Heather Carrington II. Public Comment James McCormick introduced himself and his candidacy for City Council. He also expressed his concern about ensuring adequate onsite parking as Champlain Housing Trust moves forward with developing Butternut Station, a multi-unit permanently affordable homeownership property on the O’Brien Community Center site. The Commission and staff indicated that the parking requirements for the development are established by the existing zoning requirements, contained in the form based code for the gateway district. Sam Myers also introduced himself and his candidacy for City Council. III. Approve Previous Meeting Minutes Meeting minutes from December and January were tabled due to lack of quorum of members who had attended each. IV. Council Update As a means of better sharing information between City Council and the policy Commissions, we have added a monthly agenda item for a Council update. Councilor Jim Duncan reported on the following: l The Planning Commission is working on updates to the zoning regulations. They have expressed interest in working more closely with the Housing Commission moving forward, particularly when considering policies that directly impact housing supply and affordability. Councilor Duncan will provide further clarification on the timeline for future collaboration at our next meeting. l Access to the online minimum housing complaint form has been added on the City website to a more prominent location under the “How Do I…” tab. The form was reformatted in 2017 to be easily fillable and submitted directly online. It was underutilized, and the new point of access should make it much easier to find. l City Council received a presentation on February 16th from Champlain Housing Trust on the proposed Butternut Station development on the O’Brien Community Center property. CHT presented the design and development plans for a Champlain Housing Trust (CHT) built multi-unit perpetually affordable homeownership opportunity to be located at the street front of the O’Brien Community Center. Council reacted generally favorably to the design, and approved staff to commence negotiating the required agreements with CHT while concurrently undertaking the permitting process. V. City Updates Staff reported that the Housing Commission recommendations for exemptions to the proposed  located at the street front of the O’Brien Community Center. Council reacted generally favorably to the design, and approved staff to commence negotiating the required agreements with CHT while concurrently undertaking the permitting process. V. City Updates Staff reported that the Housing Commission recommendations for exemptions to the proposed transportation impact fee have been reported to City Council, and will be included in a comprehensive memo to Council covering all of the Commissions’ feedback. In addition, staff expanded on the CHT project update with specifics about the construction timeline. The project is currently projected to start construction in July 2021, and to be completed in May or June of 2022. VI. Historic Resource Inventory & Preservation Priorities Discussion In 2019 a broad community conversation about preserving historic buildings in Winooski emerged in response to the potential redevelopment of “The Mansion” parcel at 109 Main Street. Residents expressed an interest in ensuring that we preserve Winooski’s history, while continuing the community vision for dense, urban development along the gateway corridors. In response, City staff secured a Municipal Planning Grant in December of 2019 to hire a historic preservation consultant. VHB was hired to conduct and prepare a Historic Resources Inventory (HRI) for the City of Winooski gateway corridor districts including Route 2 (Main Street), Route 15 (East Allen Street) and Malletts Bay Avenue, facilitate community dialogue to identify preservation priorities, and to provide a recommended preservation bylaw for the City. Britta Tonn, the consultant from VHB provided an overview of the inventory findings (included in 2/22 meeting materials) and facilitated a discussion about community priorities specifically through a housing lens. The Commission would like to ensure that preservation requirements do not place an undue financial burden on property owners seeking to improve energy efficiency or make necessary repairs to their properties. They also discussed the need to avoid creating barriers to the production of further housing supply in Winooski. The possibility of accessing historic tax credits to rehabilitate housing was considered a potential benefit of the preservation ordinance. The Commission also discussed whether there might be a need for specific language guiding the transition zones between historic districts and new development to avoid the creation of jarring juxtapositions in adjacent buildings. VII. Housing Trust Fund Update and Discussion Staff has been working with Opportunities Credit Union (OCU) to develop a memorandum of understanding (MOU) for loan origination and servicing for the Housing Trust Fund (HTF). The structure of the HTF is significantly altered from the Home Improvement Program (HIP) which Opportunities has been servicing for over a decade, and requires substantial alteration and changes to party responsibilities. Based on conversations with OCU staff, the probable timeline for HTF rollout will be by the end of March 2021. OCU staff is extremely supportive of the HTF program as proposed, but has recommended minor changes to the down payment assistance policies. The program as written requires the following: “Participants’ total monthly mortgage payment may not exceed thirty percent (30%) of monthly gross income”; and “Participants may not hold more than $10,000.00 in savings or any other form of liquid asset. Participants must pledge any sum over the $10,000.00 for down payment or closing costs. (Maximum liquid assets requirement)” OCU staff has suggested that these requirements may make the down payment assistance program less accessible, competitive and effective for potential borrowers. The requirement that mortgage payments cannot exceed 30% of monthly gross income may effectively exclude low or moderate income homebuyers due to a lack of housing stock that could potentially meet that threshold. This is especially true for low income households, which earn under 80% AMI (low income). While an applicant may qualify for a mortgage that would effectively cost less than their  OCU staff has suggested that these requirements may make the down payment assistance program less accessible, competitive and effective for potential borrowers. The requirement that mortgage payments cannot exceed 30% of monthly gross income may effectively exclude low or moderate income homebuyers due to a lack of housing stock that could potentially meet that threshold. This is especially true for low income households, which earn under 80% AMI (low income). While an applicant may qualify for a mortgage that would effectively cost less than their rent, they would be ineligible for down payment assistance if they did not meet the 30% threshold. Currently over a quarter of renters in Winooski pay more than 50% of their monthly income in rent. The Commission voted to strike the policy language requiring the mortgage payment to be under 30% of income, thus allowing those who qualify for a mortgage through Opportunities Credit Union to participate in the down payment assistance program. In addition, the Commission expressed interest in allowing first time homebuyers to utilize the down payment assistance in conjunction with other down payment programs like VHFA’s assistance program. This “piggy backing” of funds would allow for homebuyers to cover a larger down payment, or both down payment and closing costs. In addition, the Commission voted to align the maximum liquid assets requirement for the down payment assistance program with other existing programs in Vermont at $30,000. The policy document will be revised by staff to reflect the changes prior to rollout of the Housing Trust Fund. VIII. Family Housing Incentives Due to the late hour, the Commission decided to continue this discussion at the March meeting. The Housing Commission has previously looked at the impacts of various incentives for housing affordability using the Grounded Solutions Inclusionary Housing Calculator available at: https://inclusionaryhousing.org/calculator/. This tool allows the user to add and remove incentives to see the financial impact to the project feasibility reflected. The incentives include all of the approaches that we are discussing, and serves as an excellent modelling tool for quantifying the financial impact of possible approaches. Staff encouraged Housing Commissioners to utilize this tool prior to our March meeting to evaluate what the relative financial impact of various approaches could be. For example, we have previously used this tool to evaluate changes to parking minimum requirements on the feasibility of a real world construction project in Winooski. For a 24 unit housing development, waiver of the full fees discussed in the previous section would save the project $107,522. However, a 25% reduction in required minimum parking would save the project $261,000. Staff committed to sending out the pro forma specifics of that real development project for Commissioners to plug into the Housing Calculator. IX. Adjourn Motion by: Leslie Second: Deac Meeting End Time: 7:56 PM