Dallasites Say Housing Policy Needs New Strategies For Affordability, Home Repair, And Preservation Programs
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The Dallas City Council has criticized its Housing and Neighborhood Revitalization staff for not collecting enough public feedback for the city’s 10-year housing policy.
It’s not known whether people simply aren’t interested in the policy, don’t think their input will make a difference, or if the city has failed in its public outreach efforts. Earlier this month, housing staff tried again to engage the public through a telephone town hall meeting, a virtual kickoff event, and two in-person workshops. A briefing reviewing the results of the Dallas Housing Policy public engagement process is scheduled before the City Council’s Housing and Homelessness Solutions Committee on Jan. 22.
The effort to re-engage the public comes less than two months after Housing and Neighborhood Revitalization Director David Noguera resigned to take a job with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in Miami. Cynthia Rogers-Ellickson is now serving as interim director.
The city contracted with California-based TDA Consulting on the public engagement piece of the housing policy. In particular, Dallas leaders want residents to weigh in on target investment areas for affordable housing.
Respondents to a poll during a Nov. 9 telephone town hall meeting responded that their top priorities for target investment areas are those that have affordable housing in poor condition and those that need affordable homeownership opportunities. About 27 percent of participants selected areas that need affordable rental housing, and 15 percent selected areas that lack affordable housing.
Dallas Housing Policy 2033
Assistant Housing Director Thor Erickson said the goal of the housing policy is to increase affordability citywide.
“We are tasked with selecting three to five equity strategy target areas for investment to preserve and produce affordable housing,” he said. “We are committed to continuous engagement and will continue to seek resident participation to develop neighborhood revitalization strategies within the selected areas.”
A poll conducted on the telephone town hall showed that 49 percent of respondents said the greatest housing need in their community was home repair and preservation. In a separate poll, 64 percent of respondents said streets, roads, and transportation improvements are most needed to support quality housing.
Erickson said the city typically invests in “real property” — homes and apartments rather than manufactured homes — when planning affordable housing.
“However, those are still liveable homes that have a place in the city of Dallas,” he said. “As we understand the targeted areas more and where manufactured homes make sense from a land use policy and perspective for the city, we’ll consider alignment of where different housing typologies align within all areas of the city of Dallas.”
Affordability is defined as a household contributing less than 30 percent to their rent or mortgage, Erickson explained.
Target Areas For Reinvestment
Area Redevelopment Manager Jasmine Bazley said city staff reviewed data including indicators of equity, community characteristics, housing characteristics, historical disparities, and current market conditions when looking for potential investment areas.
Those factors, along with potential partnership opportunities, will be considered when choosing the target areas — but the city also wants the public to weigh in on which areas need a hand up, Bazley said.
A recent city audit showed that Dallas experienced a decrease of 5,142 units, or 1.77 percent, from 2016 through 2022 in the number of single-family housing units and an increase of 56,050 housing units, or 25.06 percent, from 2016 through Year 2022 in the number of multifamily housing units.
City Auditor Mark Swann recommended that the City:
- Assign responsibility for maintaining and reporting the City’s housing units’ data.
- Establish the City’s definitions for the terms “single-family housing unit” and multifamily housing unit.”
- Assign responsibility for calculating and monitoring the City’s housing affordability index.
Management agreed to all three recommendations.
Over 20,000 affordable housing units are currently in the pipeline, Erickson told attendees at a public meeting on the housing policy.
“Many of those are apartments,” he said. “There are homeownership opportunities available throughout different communities in Dallas where developers have taken advantage of our land bank or land transfer program in order to achieve affordable housing. Through our new housing policy and selecting our target areas, we hope to be able to recruit developers to be able to build the type of housing that’s needed and supports the community within these target areas.”
