Better housing options would welcome young families

Last year, my younger brother — like me, a teacher — looked into moving his family from Minnesota back home to Connecticut. In St. Paul, he paid the mortgage for his home with income earned from renting out a small, separate accessory dwelling unit. Over time, his family grew to include two kids, and he used the spare unit in flexible ways.

When he looked in Connecticut, he found little housing that was remotely similar. Sadly for me, he settled in another state. I have come to understand that the reason he didn’t find the flexible, affordable housing he was looking for was zoning. Our broken, overly restrictive land-use laws prevent our state’s residents from having diverse choices. Through innovative zoning reform proposals, such as those found in Senate Bill 1024, which is currently pending before the legislature, we can ensure Connecticut becomes more welcoming.

One of the most impactful provisions of SB 1024 is that it would legalize the kind of housing my brother and his young family found so attractive in Minnesota. Accessory dwelling units, or ADUs, are great for people who wish to offset or reduce the amount of money they spend on housing. But they are illegal in many Connecticut towns, and even where they are allowed, they are severely restricted.

In my town of Westbrook, for example, accessory dwelling units are not allowed as of right, meaning they have to go through onerous public hearings before they can be approved. Westbrook also makes detached ADUs (like garage apartments) illegal, except on 0.03 percent of our land. It would be great for Westbrook homeowners to lower their housing costs and provide inclusive housing to young people and seniors alike.

Westbrook is not alone in our regressive stance toward ADUs. Forty-three percent of the single family districts in the state also do not allow ADUs without onerous public hearings. SB 1024 offers a common-sense solution for towns and homeowners. It also expressly allows individual towns to control architectural standards, whether ADUs are used as short-term rentals or not, and whether owner-occupancy is required.

One proposal that was removed from SB 1024 by the committee that adopted it would have legalized new four-unit housing near Westbrook’s train station. Just 4.9 percent of Westbrook is zoned for four-plus-unit housing, creating an environment of housing “unaffordability” that hurts everyone. It is no wonder, then, that almost 37.1 percent of Westbrook is costburdened, meaning that nearly 4 in 10 residents spend a third or more of their income on housing. Our town needs to beef up the housing stock around our train station, and since our town hasn’t stepped up to do so, state legislators should consider adding the proposal back into SB 1024.

I’d venture to guess that it wasn’t just my brother who took a look at Connecticut and passed. According to recent census data, Connecticut’s population growth over the past decade ranks 47th in the nation. We just don’t have the housing options that people want: we’re building the same old, same old single-family housing and choking off the supply of more diverse housing options. Enacting zoning reform is an important step in bringing Connecticut into the 21st century. Reform can’t come fast enough for our family to be reunited.