Dueling Affordable Housing Proposals Go To Metro Council

Affording a place to live in Nashville has become more difficult amid the city’s rapid growth.

But figuring out what the city should do to maintain affordable housing units — and encourage builders to create more — hasn’t been easy. Until a wave of recent attention, Metro has tried relatively few methods of increasing affordable housing.

Now, less than a month since the Metro Council put in motion one of the policies most coveted by advocates, signs of uncertainty have surfaced, and work has already begun on a “backup plan.”

At issue is a Metro effort to create an “inclusionary zoning” policy. This kind of rule would require that new home construction projects include some affordable units.

While many specifics would need to be determined, a council bill that passed the first of three readings on May 19 took the first step to requiring affordable units across Davidson County. In fact, the plan suggests a requirement that 14 percent of the units in a new development remain affordable.

Advocate Floyd Shechter, with A VOICE, said 500 counties nationwide already have similar building requirements.

“It is time to act,” he said.

Yet on Tuesday night, the Metro Council could consider a slightly different bill. Although much of the language is the same, the new proposal eliminates the 14 percent requirement.

Councilman Brady Banks said he heard some opposition to the earlier, more aggressive proposal.

“We were getting the sense that the original bill, the way it was proposed, with some of the mandates … those kinds of questions really hadn’t been answered by the Planning Commission.”

The new bill that Banks is co-sponsoring could also take a slightly different path to get council approval — a route that requires six fewer votes than the first bill filed in May.

Banks called his bill a “safety net” that he is willing to defer. He would push for his version later, should the first measure face too much resistance.

If either proposal moves forward, the council and other planning officials will need several weeks to get to a final vote and even longer to determine the specifics of the policy.

“I wish I could tell you that this was a clear road map, but it’s not,” Shechter said. “There’s a lot of forks in the road between now and (final reading).”