Council Updates, Porchfest, Multifamily Housing, And More

Exclusionary Zoning and Multifamily Housing
Following a Housing Committee meeting on exclusionary zoning and multifamily housing efforts, many of you in the community have reached out to let me know how you feel about the issue. It’s a complicated and nuanced issue, and I am glad we are continuing the discussion on ending exclusionary housing and eliminating single and two-family only zones – I sponsored a policy order with Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler, Marc McGovern, and Denise Simmons in 2020, which was the first formal request for the city to eliminate exclusionary zoning. It is a bold, actionable step that we can take in short order – to allow multifamily housing across the city. And the city council can take that step by passing as soon as possible the currently pending citizen zoning petition – the Ronayne Petition. The petition would allow multi-family homes everywhere and end exclusionary zoning, and the zoning language is written. That petition will be heard by the Planning Board on May 21. That petition takes a similar approach to CDD: making multifamily housing legal across the city by primarily “legalizing” existing housing and allowing homeowners additional flexibility with ADUs. And it also doesn’t risk undermining affordability which other approaches might. I hope you’ll consider supporting it. You can write into the Planning Board by emailing: planningboardcomment@cambridgema.gov. The City Council will be discussing the petition on May 28.

In addition to ending exclusionary zoning, there are other complicated and often conflicting ideas discussed in the Housing Committee meeting last week – the headline, of course, was the idea, presented by one councillor, to allow six-stories, by right, anywhere in the city. I have concerns with this specific proposal from a number of perspectives, including on the affordability side. Making that kind of large, wholesale change can impact a lof of existing zoning in complicated ways. CDD’s presentation suggested it would take some additional thought to tackle the more complex and challenging issues of how to incentivize more affordable housing and to complement 100% affordable housing development with structures like social housing and mixed income models. Zoning changes don’t exist in a vacuum – making too many wholesale changes to citywide zoning without consideration may impact affordable housing production and affordability. It’s a nuanced issue, and I would encourage as much dialogue and community process as possible as we consider these options. I completely support ending exclusionary zoning, and fully support the Ronayne petition as a bold, significant step towards addressing housing affordability through our zoning code. Once that petition is in place, we can then tackle the other issues.

Resident Parking Permit Fee
Following a policy order that I sponsored, several discussions with Transportation staff and the Law Department, the City Manager has come forward with a recommendation to increase the cost of the resident parking permit sticker from $25 per year to $75 per year. There will also be a low income-eligible option, which will remain at $25 per year. I held a committee meeting in December of last year to discuss options for amending parking fees and regulations throughout the City in order to further support the City’s goals of low carbon travel and since then, I have been working with the Law Department to understand the landscape of state law as it relates to implementing different fees. One important change will be to raise parking permitting fees to accurately reflect the real costs associated with the permitting system within the city. After further study, TPT has determined that the permit program costs at least $75 per vehicle to administer. But also, as was indicated by the Council, we also want to make sure we continue to support the needs of low-income residents, so I am glad to see the City Manager indicate they will implement the income-eligible option. By developing a low-income threshold, we could better reflect the needs of residents of all ages. At this point, the City Manager does not recommend raising the parking permit fees for larger vehicles that take up more space on the public right of way, which I had pushed for. We will discuss further on Monday, but I expect these recommendations to be implemented for next year’s parking permit program.

Porchfest
I, like so many others, had a blast enjoying Porchfest Somerville last weekend. I ran into several Cambridge folks who asked why Cambridge didn’t have Porchfest. I want the City of Cambridge to consider launching our own porchfest event in the future. It’s a wonderful way to connect with community and the arts. This week, I sponsored a policy order that asks the City Manager to look into organizing our own event. There are a lot of different models to work with – Boston’s events are more targeted to individual neighborhoods, Somerville spans the entire city but staggers the performances west-east every two hours, and Watertown has tried to organize a bike route for their event. There are lots of interesting ideas Cambridge could consider. I like the idea that every city uses a different model that works for their geography and logistical needs.