Commission to review proposed inclusionary zoning policy

By Linda Bryant, Nashville Post, January 13, 2016 - Nashville’s legislation on affordable and workforce housing faces a key hurdle Thursday when the Metropolitan Planning Commission meets to consider approval of long-awaited inclusionary zoning legislation.

But even as the Metro Planning Department’s IZ proposal moves forward via a commission review, it is paradoxically in the process of slowing down.

Crosscurrents are being created by a few factors including the absence of a funding structure for as much as $10 million in recurring funds needed from Metro’s budget and misgivings about skittish developers seeking eleventh hour changes to the proposal.

Meanwhile, affordable housing advocates are signaling displeasure with the proposal and say they will let their concerns be known at tomorrow's 4 p.m. Metro Planning Commission meeting.....Bill Hostettler, principal broker with Nashville-based HND Realty LLC,  said that the UZO covers building uses beyond residential, such as retail and office. As such, he is concerned that even an incentives-based IZ policy could dissuade mixed-use development that includes residential (if the incentives for the preferred options are not as strong as those for a less-preferred option).....(read more)

This should be deferred by the Planning Commission. No one is happy with it and the Supreme Court may very well rule that this type of "taking" is unconstitutional and there is no source of funding to fund the "incentives." Also, it is doubtful it will result in very many units of affordable housing being built and it will most likely lead to an increase in the price of housing and a decrease in the availability of affordable housing; not an increase.

Advocates of a free market and private property rights should attend the Thursday 4PM  meeting of the Planning Commission and object to this proposal. The meeting will be held in the auditorium of the Howard Office Building, 700 Second Avenue South.

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