Why housing matters and what local officials can do to foster quality housing in their communities - presented by Christa Ouderkirk Franzi to the NYCOM Spring 2019

1. Housing Matters for Economic Development:
Why & What Can Local Officials Do to Foster Quality
Housing in Their Communities?
Christa Ouderkirk Franzi, CEcD
May 2019

2. Agenda
1. Emerging trends in Economic Development
2. Why housing matters
3. Market trends
4. Tactics for addressing housing needs
5. Discussion

3. Christa Ouderkirk Franzi, CEcD
Senior Project Manager
• 10+ Years Economic and Community Development
• Northeastern Economic Development Association (NEDA),
Board Member, Communications Chair, Member of the
Year (2016)
• International Economic Development Council’s (IEDC)
CEcD Certification (2016)
Expertise
• Placemaking and downtown revitalization
• Economic strategies for rural communities & small cities
• Entrepreneurial ecosystem assessment and strategy
• Building networks for economic development
christa@camoinassociates.com
@ta9ti | 607-221-6876

4. What is Economic Development to you?
Question

5. Economic Development is…
Job stability
and creation
Planning, Organizing, and Acting to Support the Economy
Common end goals:
Tax base
stability and
growth
Diversification
of economy
and tax base
Wealth creation
and
diversification

6. Economic Development is Accomplished
Through…
Tools and techniques:
 Business retention and expansion
 Business attraction
 Global trade and foreign investment
 Workforce development
 Business technical assistance
 Innovation and entrepreneurial support
 Quality of place/place-based development
 Community development
As well as:
 Planning
 Organizing
 Implementation
 Resource Development

7. Trends Affecting Our Economic Future
Workforce.
Workforce.
WORKFORCE.
Ecosystems
Tech of
Everything
Quality of
Place
Rapid Change
and
Uncertainty

8. Workforce is the
top issue.
Since we emerged from the
financial recession of 2008-09,
access to talent has become
the top challenge identified by
companies everywhere we
work, across all sectors.Onondaga Community College
Short term training that leads to living wage jobs.
Trends Affecting Our Economic Future
Image Source:
http://www.sunyocc.edu/index.aspx?menu=979&collgrid=552
Phlebotomist Medical Billing
Line Cook Manufacturing

9. Workforce Trends
• Workforce is regional, not local
• Diversity – immigration – shift from problem
to be dealt with to economic opportunity
• No one answer, all of these are important:
• Service jobs
• Middle skills jobs
• High tech
• Technical and soft skills
• Lifelong blended learning – traditional as
well as non-tradition higher education – task
economy
• Growth of the gig economy and
independent workers
• Employers must now chase talent
Trends Affecting Our Economic Future
Where workers employed in Hudson, live

10. Why Housing Matters for EconDev
Making the Case
Economic Development = Workforce = Humans = Places to Live

11. How many of you have been
in business or government
for 20+ years?
Trends Affecting Our Economic FutureQuestion
Housing ebbs and flows with economy.

12. Growing Affordability Gap
Market Trends
U.S. Home prices are growing faster than wages.

13. Convergence of…
Trends Affecting Our Economic Future
Market Trends
In 2008-09, we hit one of the heaviest economic down-cycles in a
while. This stopped most residential development and caused
foreclosures.
Meanwhile, markets were changing.

14. U.S. Population 2005
Market Trends
Baby Boomers
Millennials

15. U.S. Population 2005 U.S. Population 2020
Market Trends
Baby Boomers
Millennials
Baby Boomers
Millennials
Baby Boomers
Millennials

16. Now we need housing for
Trends Affecting Our Economic Future
Market Trends
Aging baby boomers who
are downsizing
(ages 55-75)
Millennials who make up the
workforce
(ages 23-38)

17. Think of the places you’ve lived at
different stages in your life.
Housing Preferences

18. Housing Preferences Changed
Market Trends
• Biggest Shift: Stronger preference toward
rentals – high quality rentals
Millennials
• More racially and ethnically diverse
• Delay marriage and having children
• Prefer high-cost cities, housing supply is tight
• Increasing education debt
• Hard to save for down payment
• Supply of affordable housing declined
• Lived through the recession – perception of
real estate is different
Baby Boomers
• Low-Maintenance
• Aging Assistance
The Mill, Downtown Glens Falls

19. Housing Preferences
Changed
Market Trends
• Stronger preference toward rentals
• Smaller units
• Connections to transit (TOD)
• Walkability
• In-unit “Amenity creep”
• Neighborhood Amenities
• Community Connection
Pet Friendly
Curated Gardens
High-speed internet property-wide
Co-working space
Smart home features
Fitness amenities
Sports facilities
Coffee shop
Rooftop deck
Green space
Outdoor kitchen/dining

20. Quality of Place
is Critical
Trends Affecting Competitiveness
People want authentic, connected
environments that inspire creativity
and generate the exchange of rich
ideas that will support their own
personal and professional pursuits.
Talented people aren't looking for a
job; they are seeking an
environment that stimulates and
inspires.
Downtown Syracuse
Market Trends

21. Emerging Trends Impacting Markets
• US fertility below replacement + reduced immigration = “double whammy”
for economic growth
• Long-term – slowing demand for real estate
• Millennials are (finally) suburbanizing
• BUT! Large homes, good schools, and green space are not enough
• Access to transit and walkability to shopping and entertainment increasingly critical
• “Amenity creep” – residential and office (and even retail)
• Pet care, “curated gardens,” refrigerated storage, concierge
• Live/work/play – retail, coworking
Market Trends

22. Today’s Markets
Multifamily
• “Renters by choice” demand mostly met
• Expense of development has gone up fast
• Income growth not supporting rent
• Can developers retain their hold on renters by
choice?
• Can they make money providing housing to
“not-by-choice” renters?
• Technology, automation, talent, regulation
Single-Family
• Favorable economic conditions, but
uncertainty
• “Wait and see”
Market Trends

23. The Housing Conundrum
The Problem
Housing markets are local. However, in most
upstate NY markets, there is an oversupply of
housing units, but not enough of the right type of
housing, at the right price-points, connected to
the right type of assets and amenities.

24. A Housing
Affordability
Crisis
The Problem
• Rising construction costs
and land prices
• Undersupply of desired
units
• Rising prices
• Rising mortgage rates

25. Workforce housing in
tourism-based
economies is hard to
find
The Problem
High-demand by wealthy second
homeowners price-out the local workforce
who cannot afford to live where they work.
Lake Placid, NY
Bar Harbor, ME

26. Economic Development: What can we affect?
Workforce Business
Attraction,
Retention &
Expansion
Local & Regional
Economic
Development
Quality of
Place
Innovation
Entrepreneurship
Incubation
Acceleration
Real Estate
Sites
Infrastructure
& Planning
Land and Site
Development
Redevelopment
Downtown
Corridor &
District
Development
Land Use
Regs
Zoning Planning Marketing
Place-
making
Elements a Municipality can Affect

27. Public-Private Partnerships
Working with the development community is critical. Build trust and seek to
understand their goals and align with your community needs.
Tactics
The Kingstonian, Uptown Kingston

28. Direct subsidy
• Tax incentive
• Tax credit
• Abatement
• PILOT (mixed-use)
• Donation of land
Tactics
Durkee Street, Plattsburgh

29. Build housing
Tactics
• Community land trust
• Get into the development business
• Non-profit models –
• Habitat for Humanity is changing
tactics from one-offs to neighborhood-
scale projects

30. Increase density
near job centers
Tactics
Modifying zoning to allow
more density lets developers
spread costs over more units.
Groton, CT

31. Accommodate
Mixed-Used
Development
Reduce requirements on
mixed-use development
so residential can support
desired office/industrial
development.
Can create desired quality
of place.
Tactics
Higganum Village, Haddam, CT

33. Other Accommodations to
Incentivize Affordable Units
Tactics
• Less parking
• More accessory building
• More units
• Invest in infrastructure

34. Get creative
Tactics
Allowing innovative developments like micro units, granny flats, pocket-
neighborhoods, and industry-specific units (housing for teachers, policy, etc.) can
meet immediate market-needs.
Canalside Pocket Neighborhood, Canastota, NY
https://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=qWzd1QArpRU#action=share

35. “All of the above” is
needed in some markets
• $1.1 M community development block grants
• $12.8 M low income tax credit NYSHCR
• $1.3 M from HCR’s Housing Trust Fund Corp.
• $2 M from Rural and Community investment fund
• $2.3 in equity raised by brownfield tax credits
• $100,000 from the City of Binghamton Home
• $48,000 incentive grant from NYSERDA
Tactics
$20 M housing project of 48 affordable units on
Binghamton’s North Side
Affordable Housing Project, Binghamton, NY

36. Factors for Economic Development
Implementation Success
Trust
Internally and
externally
Process & Procedures
To build trust in the
process
Leadership
Adaptability and leading
through uncertainty
Communications
Open and active, across
networks
Capacity
Ability to function within
a system of networks
Adaptability
Respond and adapt to
external changes
New Funding Models
Reduce reliance on
government entities
Ongoing assessment
Continual improvement
and efficient use of funds

37. Lessons from the Field
• Don’t bite off more than you can chew! Break projects
into smaller digestible components based on your
organization’s and partners’ capacity to implement
• Understand what you can have impact over – i.e. at local
level you can impact land-use, zoning, permitting,
customer service
• Give collaboration and engagement within region,
diverse stakeholders, and the public more than lip
service – design and implement together
• Get comfortable making collective decisions without
perfect information and predictable outcomes
• Communicate externally AND internally

38. What housing challenges are your
communities facing?

39. www.camoinassociates.com/navigator
More Economic
Development
Trends

40. Christa Ouderkirk Franzi, CEcD
Senior Project Manager
christa@camoinassociates.com
@ta9ti | 607-221-6876