Chapel Hill needs more housing, but opinions differ on where to build it

Chapel Hill leaders acknowledged the fear of proposed changes to single-family zoning Monday night, but also repeated their support for more housing options in more neighborhoods and removing rules that once enforced racial segregation.

The Housing Choices for a Complete Community initiative, in development for over a year, has generated controversy, including verbal attacks on town staff, Town Council members noted during a work session.

Council member Tai Huynh, who parents were refugees, related his own family’s choice between rent and food.

“We are fighting to allow more families to make choices to be a part of this community,” Huynh said. “There are those who choose to put 60% of their income into housing just to be here so that their kids can be in our school district. No one should be making those choices.”

The plan was recently revised in response to feedback, removing a provision that would have allowed different housing types in all neighborhoods.

There were some “genuine valid concerns about the impacts of some of these housing types, that frankly do need additional work, additional refinement, additional research to understand more fully what those impacts are,” Senior Planner Tas Lagoo said.

5 parts to the new plan

As currently drafted, the plan:

▪ Allows duplexes and accessory apartments, whether detached or in a garage or basement, on most single-family lots. Also possible are cottage homes with one or two families sharing up to 1,600 square feet on at least a half-acre lot

▪ Allows triplexes, fourplexes, and cottage courts — several small homes clustered on a single lot — in existing multifamily districts.

▪ Lets town staff approve projects with up to four units in multifamily districts that already allow three to seven units, and lets the town’s Planning Commission approve cottage courts in multifamily districts.

▪ Would add design standards, pre-approved housing plans, and rules, such as for parking, stormwater and tree protection

▪ Allows accessory apartments on cultural, institutional and religious properties

A 2021 housing study found the town needs to build 35% more housing, or roughly 440 units a year to serve first-time homebuyers, families with young children, divorcees, empty nesters and seniors.

Only about 48 units a year are needed to serve UNC-Chapel Hill students, it said.

The changes would not be enforceable in neighborhoods with a restrictive covenant, entitlement or homeowner’s association. It also wouldn’t change the existing land uses in areas covered by a Neighborhood Conservation District.

It’s possible the council could get a final plan in May and vote in June, but Mayor Pam Hemminger and interim Town Manager Chris Blue will work with staff on a more specific timeline.

Legal limits, housing pressure, public comments

Chapel Hill Planning Director Britany Waddell and her staff pointed out a few “elephants in the room”:

▪ The town’s 2020 land-use goals emphasized the need to create places for everyone, including students, and the town doesn’t have any ability to restrict who buys or rents housing, or whether that involves local or out-of-town investors and developers.

▪ Property owners are already tearing down older homes and replacing them with new, larger homes.

▪ The proposed changes would not guarantee affordable housing, or the price at which housing is sold or leased.

▪ The divisive, often hostile, conversation is not constructive.

“As planners, we do not bring our personal opinions and preferences into our formulation of recommendations. However, some of the staff interactions with the public included personal attacks on their expertise, their experience and their residency within the town or lack thereof, which is ironic given the topic at hand,” Waddell said. Very few town employees can afford to live in Chapel Hill.

▪ The town faces outside pressure from a national housing shortage and state legislative plans to relieve the crisis, including with fast or by-right approval of housing projects. It also is constrained by past decisions, such as the creation of the rural buffer and the urban services boundary, which limit where public water, sewer and more dense construction can happen.

“We agreed not to sprawl,” Hemminger said. “That means in order to meet these housing demands, we’re going to have to look for ways to do it from inside our community.”

Council thoughts on zoning plan

Council member Adam Searing, an outlier in many council decisions who has opposed the zoning changes, made two key arguments:

▪ Other cities haven’t seen zoning changes attract much more housing, he said, and in Chapel Hill, it’s “enormously controversial.” He recommended the town focus instead on what’s in development and already being considered.

▪ He also said it’s an equity issue when some neighborhoods can afford to organize, hire lawyers and create covenants that insulate them against the proposed changes, while others cannot afford that option.

“To me, that just seems just like a terrible way to try and implement public policy,” Searing said.

Staff and other council members said they do not support perpetuating land-use policies that exclude people, such as single-family zoning, which was implemented during integration as a way to keep Black families out of white neighborhoods.

Council member Jessica Anderson said it’s “frustrating” to hear equity used as an argument against the zoning changes, when the equity in question is between neighborhoods that can and can’t afford to establish those same exclusionary covenants.

“I can tell you (as a white mother of mixed-race children) that we have work to do, and talking about how we should allow ourselves to be bought out of this conversation (by hiring lawyers) because it wouldn’t be equitably implemented, just really, it just really pisses me off,” she said.

What other council members said:

Amy Ryan: Get more information about the potential economic effects and the competition between family and student housing. Consider incentives for more affordable housing, from smaller designs to cheaper fees for utility hookups and the approval process, and a plan that would allow two townhouses on a lot instead of a duplex.

Michael Parker: Offer pre-approved designs that limit the number of bedrooms and bathrooms to deter student renters, and plan for periodic check-ins to see how the policy is working.

Paris Miller-Foushee: The history of racial segregation in housing is critical in talking about zoning changes, and the town also should talk with local developers and banks about creating an “ecosystem” for better housing choices.

Karen Stegman: Support “quaint” cottage courts, rental and owner-occupied housing, and require single-family homes to also meet tree coverage and stormwater rules. Reach out to community members who haven’t weighed in to get more input.

“I see council’s role as really planning for the future, and that includes people who maybe rent here but want to own here and can’t yet, or people who drive here every day for work and want to live here but can’t yet,” she said.