Locally, only Yellow Springs and Dayton allow accessory dwelling units in residential districts. I designed an ADU for a client in Yellow Springs in 2018. The Village and the City of Dayton both treat ADUs as conditional uses, so an applicant needs approval from the planning commission or the zoning appeals board. Assuming the size, setback, and general design of the ADU conforms to the local guidelines, they will typically be approved.
In Dayton, the zoning code was only recently amended to allow ADUs but already a number of homeowners are taking advantage. People are building ADUs to provide in-law suites, create accessible housing for family members with disabilities, or for additional streams of income.
ADUs are a small step towards making up our housing shortfall. They still take time to permit and construct, but in effect we’re crowdsourcing the production of new housing in the City. Any homeowner with room on their lot can become a housing developer and with more interest we may see prefabricated or turnkey products that reduce construction time.
Kenya Baker: Community land trusts can be a powerful tool to fight generational poverty
Unified Power (UP) is an example of a local community land trust gaining its footing in the West Dayton area to help Black people who have experienced high levels of disenfranchisement and suffered from generational poverty. The mission of UP is to focus on Awareness, Access, and Quality Affordable Housing for low-income families in West Dayton.
Awareness deals with helping impoverished families to refine their self-identity. Many people who struggle to make ends meet have not had the luxury of knowing who they are at their core.
So, through various educational modalities, Unified Power works to close the gap in self-awareness, community awareness and resource awareness. By closing the awareness gap, UP builds bridges and creates accessibility to community resources. We do not know what we don’t know.
Finally, Quality Affordable Housing can establish generational wealth for oppressed families. The end goal, after boosting awareness of self and community in impoverished communities and creating access points for resources, is to offer homes and pathways to upward mobility for the downtrodden and forgotten.
Kémo A’akhutera: Prefabricated housing could make grassroots development possible
Higher costs in construction and labor scarcity are major factors driving housing affordability to a 10-year low, according to the NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index.
Discussions around solutions are in full swing: recruiting the next generation of workers, expanding the labor pool (only 9% of the construction sector currently consists of women), and investing in new building systems and methods to improve worker productivity. It’s worth noting that worker productivity in home building has grown by only 3% in the past 25 years, compared with 34% for the overall economy.
The industry must make progress in all of these areas — no single solution will be sufficient. Expanding the labor force without improving productivity will help in the short-run, but would result in higher costs in the future. Modular and prefab sectors are one possible source of productivity gains, but they each only make up 2% of the current single-family market, presenting an opportunity growth.
This concludes Ideas & Voices’ four-week exploration of affordable housing and development in the Miami Valley. Visit the links below to read the full series of contributed columns and to watch a recording of the Community Conversation we held on the topic on Aug. 24.
Housing affordability in the Miami Valley
As rents continue to climb across the region and many local residents find themselves working in occupations that on average do not pay enough for them to afford modest rental units, affordable housing is becoming an increasingly important issue for our communities and communities across the nation. New housing and commercial developments are planned across our region and each one sparks heated debate among residents who will live near them, the developers of these projects and civic leaders who must balance the needs of existing residents with growing the local economy and attracting newcomers.
» Community land trusts can be a powerful tool to fight generational poverty
» ‘Accessory dwelling units’ can help affordability, homelessness
» Prefabricated housing can make grassroots development possible
» Not-for-profit housing organizations step in to offer affordable homes
» Highlights from Aug. 24 Community Conversation
» Domestic violence and affordable housing shortage linked
» Ohio must bridge the gap between low wages and high rents
» COVID, housing issues have disproportionally affected low-income individuals, people of color
» Our communities should ‘build with care and thoughtfulness’
» Balancing the needs of residents with growing the local economy
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