Religious institutions want to build affordable housing. Say ‘Yes in God’s Backyard’

“Throughout California, there are churches, temples and mosques sitting on large swaths of underused land. Many religious leaders want to put that property to work serving their mission and their communities by building affordable housing.”

We can easily replace ‘California’ with ‘Indiana.’ “Senate Bill 4 by Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) would allow 100% affordable housing projects to be built by right — meaning the development proposal would be reviewed by city staff but the projects wouldn’t need planning commission or city council approval — if the developments are on land owned by religious institutions or nonprofit colleges and meet objective planning standards. A project could be built even if the zoning wouldn’t normally allow apartments, and couldn’t be slowed or blocked by environmental lawsuits.”

“Assemblymember Jesse Gabriel (D-Encino), a co-author of the bill and chair of the Legislature’s Jewish Caucus. “This is, to me, such a common-sense approach and one that can move the needle at a time when we are resource-constrained.” Given the reality that Indiana is short some 450,000 affordable housing units, this might be a way to create new housing quickly and affordably. It’s worth watching what happens in the California legislature!

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-12-27/religious-institutions-want-to-build-affordable-housing-say-yes-in-gods-backyard