Iowa City Council says no to affordable housing policy

A split City Council said Monday night that it does not, at this time, want to require developers to include affordable housing units in their projects.

It's a concept known as inclusionary zoning, and the divided council was a sign of how controversial it can be.

The council was split 4-3 against having city staff develop an inclusionary zoning ordinance. The issue is not dead, however, with the council saying it wants to study the broader affordable housing issue further and have inclusionary zoning come back to it at an undetermined time.

“While I'm interested in considering it, it seems like, at this point, we're putting the cart before the horse,” council member Susan Mims said.

Affordable housing has been a hot-button issue in Iowa City in recent years. It touches on everything from housing assistance to the large numbers of low-income students in certain schools. Many residents of southeast Iowa City believe a concentration of low-income housing is a factor in the problems that area has dealt with of late.

Mims joined Mayor Matt Hayek and council members Connie Champion and Terry Dickens in speaking against inclusionary zoning for now. Regenia Bailey, Ross Wilburn and Mike Wright were in favor.

Those three supporters noted that many of the people who are in need of affordable housing are young professionals like school teachers.

“I think we're pricing our future out of the market,” Bailey said. “Young professionals do not live here. They live in North Liberty.”

Champion said that while she liked living in a neighborhood with a range of income levels, she had a problem with mandating that developers build a certain percentage of homes affordable to people with low or moderate incomes.

“I can't ask a developer to build what I want to build,” she said.

Wilburn noted that, through zoning laws, the city already tells builders what they can and cannot do.

The city has been interested in having affordable housing more scattered throughout town. Jeff Davidson, the city's director of planning and community development, said that evidence shows that the private sector won't do this voluntarily.

The council asked staff to collect more information on affordable housing, including the possibility of using incentives to encourage, rather than require, developers to mix in low-cost homes in their projects and how inclusionary zoning has worked in some of more than the 200 other communities nationwide that have it.