Housing Committee 1/7/19

The second Housing Committee meeting took place on Jan. 7.

We spent most of the meeting brainstorming a wide range of ideas to address the housing situation.

The idea was to generate as many ideas as possible, without judgment. The notes below are taken directly from our brainstorming session and organized by category.

New Construction

• Cottage style housing (i.e. Matt Burke size, N. Clark size)
• Build new single family homes
• ICDC build & pay it off with rent
• Small, affordable, energy efficient single family homes for rent or buy
• Duplexes
• Build smaller, more practical housing–utilize available resources, skills, affordable land

Existing Homes

• Purchase houses on the market to use as rentals
• Convince owners to rent houses that haven't been used in years
• Asking seasonal renters to lower rent in order to rent all year
• Allow roommates to rent in ICDC homes (rather than a family or a couple)

Apartments

• Small, efficient apartments to rent
• Cohousing
• Convert house into rental units with shared kitchen and bathroom for singles
• Divide the parsonage into apartments
• Small, apartment style–start small so that couples in family houses don’t have to settle for a larger homes, are able to live in the smaller houses

Add-ons

• Yurts on people's property
• Add apartments on existing ICDC homes
• Trailers
• Convert outbuildings into rental units
• Develop lots for self-build

Land

• Get donated property for future housing rental opportunities
• Lot past Jeff & Judi's (is it town or ICDC?)
• Ask large landowners if they would sell in smaller lots for affordable housing

Public input

• Include a discussion of affordable housing at town meeting
• Public meeting about housing

Other strategies

• Help with work on vacant homes to make it more attractive to rent
• Flexible rent (families pay more than single ppl)
• Habitat for Humanity
• Form a group to help people build homes
• Build with no septic–composting toilets
• Get right of first refusal on homes that may be going on the market

Next steps:

• At the next meeting we will discuss ways to bring the housing conversation to the community. Some possible steps:
  • A survey
  • Item at town meeting
  • A separate community conversation about housing
• Look into rules governing zoning for duplexes/apartments and composting toilets in lieu of septic systems (Molly)