In Newington, affordable housing law has worked as intended

Jim and Nancy Vandergrift, he a retired businessman and she a retired teacher, were looking to downsize from a three-story condo in Rocky Hill a few years ago.

“We looked at a lot of places,” said Nancy.

The apartment complex they “really wanted” was Griswold Hills in Newington. They cited the “great feel” of community as well as the semi-rural setting and quality of construction.

“It's very solidly built,” said Jim.

So they got on the waiting list for a couple of years, moved in a year ago and are happy they did.

“I love it here,” said another tenant, Carla Grasso, a seven-year resident. “As a single mom, I feel really safe. We all know one another and look out for one another.”

Griswold Hills has 128 units in nine low-rise, well-kept buildings constructed in what is called the “row and garden” style, sort of clusters of row houses. What is somewhat unusual about the complex is not its appearance but its origin — it is a set-aside development, meaning that some units are set aside for persons earning less than the median income.

This and many other set-aside developments in Connecticut were aided by a state law well known by developers, housing advocates and town officials as “8-30g.”

That is the statutory citation for the state's Affordable Housing Land Use Appeals Procedure, a process created 33 years ago to promote the development of affordable housing. The law, which allows developers to override local zoning restrictions, has been highly controversial almost since it passed in 1989. There have been several efforts to abolish it, and there may be one more, depending on the outcome of the gubernatorial election.

Republican candidate Bob Stefanowski has pledged to repeal 8-30g, saying at a recent press conference that the law “simply hasn't worked,” a view shared by some local officials and residents.

Arthur T. Anderson, longtime Hartford housing specialist and co-developer of Griswold Hills in the mid-1990s with the late Marc Levine, has a different view. He said 8-30g “is the only thing that has worked.” A number of lawmakers and housing advocates agree with him.

The contrasting views highlight one of the deepest policy debates in the state: There is, by many accounts, a serious shortage of affordable housing in Connecticut, particularly for those in the low and moderate income ranges.

The housing shortage makes their lives uncertain and, according to Gov. Lamont and others, hurts the state's economy.

Can those problems be resolved without what one critic calls the “sledgehammer” of 8-30g?

The numbers suggest 8-30g has had a significant impact.

Earlier this year, veteran Hartford housing lawyer Tim Hollister, who has represented developers in scores of 8-30g cases, and his colleague Andrea Gomes used state housing data to estimate that since 1990, 8-30g has spurred the creation of about 8,500 affordable housing units, mostly rental apartments, and another 18,000 market-rate units in set-aside developments such as Griswold Hills. Market-rate units in setaside developments tend to be less expensive than comparable units in all-market rate complexes.

Nonetheless, 8-30g by itself has not solved the state's shortage of affordable housing. But, advocates say, it wasn't intended to.

“It was meant to be one tool in the toolbox,” said Kiley Gosselin, executive director of the Partnership for Strong Communities, a nonprofit that advocates for affordable housing.

Residents of a certain age may recall that housing prices surged in the 1980s, causing concerns about increased homelessness; residents being forced to spend too much of their incomes on housing; teachers, public safety officers and other essential workers being unable to afford to live in the towns where they worked; and young adults being priced out of the towns where they grew up.

Also, as the late UConn law professor Terry Tondro, a land use expert, observed in a 2001 law review article, the high cost of housing was making it difficult for companies to attract workers, even for major Fairfield County corporations to attract executives.

In short, the state needed more affordable housing, and the status quo wasn't getting it built.

In response, Gov. William O'Neill named a Blue Ribbon Commission on Housing in 1988, of which Tondro and Anderson were members.

What the commission did was make it harder for a local zoning authority, like the Planning & Zoning Commission, to turn down an application for an affordable housing project.

Let's say a developer wants to build a multi-family, mixed-income apartment complex. The developer needs approval of a site plan, and also may need a zone change. Then imagine the P&Z denies the application.

Prior to 8-30g, the developer could take an appeal to Superior Court. But the court acted on the premise that the zoning authority acted properly, even if the denial was for vague or nebulous reasons such as “adversely affects community character” or “unsuitable at that location.” So the burden of proof was on the developer to show that the P&Z improperly rejected the application, often a steep challenge.

The significant aspect of 8-30g is that it flipped the burden of proof. Now if a local zoning board turns down an application that is 8-30g compliant — meaning at least 30 percent of the unit income is restricted for a period of 40 years — the onus is on the local commission to show that its denial was for specific reasons related to public health or safety, that these interests clearly outweigh the need for affordable housing, and that the public interests cannot be protected by reasonable changes to the proposal.

The law has been tweaked and clarified over the years, notably by a second Blue Ribbon Commission in 2000, but its core is intact.

A town is exempt from 8-30g review if 10 percent of its housing is deemed affordable, defined as government subsidized or deed restricted for lower-income residents. Per the 2000 revisions, towns can win a four-year moratorium from 8-30g review if they are making progress in producing affordable housing.