Asheville – This hackneyed cry of frustration is often heard when new welfare programs are introduced: “They’re destroying the middle class!” It is equivalent to the adage, “You’re middle-class if you worry about paying bills,” because wealthy people have found their way to financial stability and poor people are eligible for welfare. Thus, people wanting to pay their bills either figure out how to become upper-class or accept the perverse incentives to go broke, and the middle class is eroded on both ends.
Asheville’s missing middle housing crisis is a different subject matter thrust into the same configuration of forces. Builders need to pay their bills, so they build houses for those who can afford it, whether through their own means or government subsidy, and scarcity drives modest, market-rate housing out of reach for middle-income families.
The solution, according to Opticos Design in Berkeley, California, is to revert housing to a style embraced before the invention of the automobile. Commissioned by the City of Asheville to perform a “Missing Middle Housing Study and Displacement Risk Assessment,” Opticos describes the middle that is missing in a way that conjures memories of Randers, Denmark.
Randers is the epitome of quaint. With a history going back to the 11th century, its old stone buildings remain sturdy and in good condition. The town is cozy, with houses built to the street, abutting each other, and making the most of tiny back yards. The cobblestone streets would make for an aggravating drive, so people prefer to walk to the shops and cultural center. If one wanders too far, however, the sweet reverie of this self-sufficient old town oasis turns abruptly into hustling and bustling modernity, complete with highways and industry.
The American dream of owning a home with a yard and a car in the garage, the report indicates, is a thing of the past. “By 2025, 85% of households will not have children, but we are building as if they will. Retirees, young professionals, and single-person households often do not need or want a large yard or house to maintain. Nearly 30% of households are single-person today,” states the study.
While socialist activists claim housing is a right and, by flawed inference, the duty of government to raise taxes to pay for construction, Opticos, for the most part, keeps government in its traditional role and recommends doing away with the policies that contributed to the erosion of mid-price housing. These include local regulations that have nothing to do with health and safety, policies that favor dependence on automobiles, and federal incentives for single-family homeownership and urban sprawl. Detrimental policies targeted in Asheville’s codes included setback requirements and height and density limits.
Opticos recommends over 40 changes to the city’s policies and zoning ordinances. As the Downtown Master Plan attempted years ago, this study recommends baking requirements into the code, leaving as little as possible to the fickle discretion of the powers that be. Several recommendations pertain to required building dimensions, setbacks, buffers, and parking spaces. Others would allow missing middle housing as a by-right use in certain neighborhoods and create subclasses of multifamily structures. Throughout, the report stresses the importance of right-sizing development as guided by community input.
The displacement analysis looks at which city development ordinances could be forcing people of color, and possibly low-income persons, to live out-county. Acknowledging that the city already has a stack of anti-displacement policies, Opticos provides a “menu” of additional offerings, such as streamlining approval processes, preserving manufactured housing, and banning single-family homes in multifamily zonings. More radical choices include eviction and foreclosure protections, rent controls, and a few forms of financial assistance.
Although Asheville’s missing middle study was published on November 17, city council had an official first whiff of it at their January 4 agenda briefing. While saying the housing shortage was occurring nationwide, Urban Planner Vaidila Satvika attributed Asheville’s problem to its popularity as a beautiful place. He highlighted how the study says the city will not meet future demand for housing with single-family construction alone. He also stressed that housing prices would continue to rise even if zoning ordinances were modified to accommodate more missing middle housing.
City Manager Debra Campbell told council they were under no obligation to accept any of the report’s recommendations. They could perhaps come up with better solutions, but change was needed. The next steps will involve assembling work groups reliant on stakeholder input and prioritizing the study’s recommendations. Priorities making staff’s cut included reducing regulations and/or creating incentives for renting accessory dwelling units, building smaller houses, and creating more walkable communities.