ULI Austin commends the work being undertaken to increase affordable housing availability.

ULI Austin’s Land Development Code Ordinances Workgroup prepared the letter to provide technical feedback on the land development code policies (“HOME 1”); specifically, whether the amendments are in alignment with policy goals and likely to produce the intended outcomes.

Although we concur that the proposed HOME 1 policies, along with the Planning Commission’s recommendations, should encourage the production of affordable housing in general, we believe the impact will be modest in the near-term, and that broader changes will be required in order to encourage housing production at the scale needed to achieve the Strategic Housing Blueprint’s targets and milestones. The letter identifies areas that should be considered for the HOME initiative to have an increased impact on affordable housing availability.