Southold Town Board adopts Community Housing Plan

After more than a year of work, courtesy of multiple town departments and bodies, the Southold Town Board unanimously adopted the Community Housing Plan Tuesday evening.

The 81-page document suggests a range of allowable uses for revenue the town has started collecting from a voter-approved half-percent real estate transfer tax that took effect in April. Town Board members have repeatedly described the plan as a “malleable” document that may change as they begin choosing ways to allocate the transfer tax funds.

The board ratified the document amid a clear townwide housing crisis. Southold’s affordable housing registry currently lists more than 600 people seeking affordable housing.

The Town Board opened a public hearing on the plan during its Sept. 26 meeting, which several dozen people attended. Among those who aired their support and concerns regarding the plan was Laurel resident David Levy. He was also the only member of the public who spoke Tuesday before the board closed the hearing and voted to adopt the plan. Mr. Levy reiterated concerns he’d expressed previously regarding a lack of guidelines for selecting qualified recipients of the funds via any recommended program listed in the plan, as well as ensuring that those who continue to reap the benefits remain eligible.

“Those details are going to be made when we have somebody implementing the plan so we can work through them,” board member Jill Doherty said in response. “They weren’t meant to be worked out prior to adopting the plan.”

“If we look at the plan, the plan is only an outline,” added board member Greg Doroski. “Specific programs still need to be outlined. I think if you look at the urgency of the problem facing the community, along with the work that’s been put in for the past year to put this plan together —which is a really exceptional document— I think we’re well suited to address this problem, and address your concerns.”

“I agree with you that the plan is a very well put together document,” Mr. Levy replied. “But it’s not a plan; it’s a series of recommendations to the Town Board. It’s a plan to make a plan … You don’t have any rules; a plan has rules. Especially when you’re awarding public money, there has to be criteria, and you need to know what those are going in.”

Following the plan’s adoption, the Town Board also voted on issuing a duty statement to hire a community housing staffer to help it decide on and implement recommendations offered within the Community Housing Plan. The measure passed 4-2, with Supervisor Scott Russell and board member Louisa Evans dissenting. Mr. Russell said he felt the methods and decisions for spending the monies generated by the tax, which will ultimately come from the Town Board, should be made first.

“We’re going to bring a housing administrator in when we don’t have a housing plan to administer? It makes no sense,” Mr Russell said. “We adopted a blueprint tonight, we didn’t adopt a plan … It’s only recommendations submitted to the board. The board needs to take a pen to paper and draft a specific plan of action.”

While the board is currently seeking one community housing employee, Southold Town may one day develop a dedicated housing department, a suggestion touted in the Community Housing Plan.

“You’ve got to do baby steps,” Ms. Doherty said in a telephone interview following Tuesday’s meeting. “There’s so much that needs to be done, and this person’s duties would be to start implementing the plan, help us pick the priorities of where to start … the [affordable housing registry], we need to make it a little more comprehensive, and get more detail in the beginning, because right now, we just have really their names and addresses and their salaries. I think we need to make that list a little more comprehensive … and that would be the first priority of this [new hire]. And we need to do education and outreach.”

The plan also recommends that the town fund low-interest loans both for first-time homebuyers and for the creation of accessory dwelling units to increase and diversify the town’s stock of year-round housing, as well as issue interest-free “hero” housing loans to veterans and active military service members, health care workers and emergency service professionals.

It is not clear how much money the half-percent tax has raised since it took effect April 1. Regardless of how much money it has or will raise, the Town Board, with the help of a future community housing employee, must now decide what next steps they must take. They may review the suggestions the plan offers and deliberate their best options on which they may focus most immediately. When asked where she would like to see the funds be spent first, Ms. Doherty pointed to both helping first-time homebuyers and creating more accessory dwelling units.

“I think ownership is really important, if somehow we could help first time homebuyers get into a house so they can start their families,” she said. “It’s important also to help seniors stay in their homes — that’s where the accessory apartments come in. Maybe the senior can move into the accessory apartment and they can rent out the bigger portion of the house.

“There’s a lot of big, beautiful houses in this town, and they can be retrofitted to having that apartment for that single person, whether that’s an elderly parent, or a young single person that is in their 20s and doesn’t want to live in the same house as their parents but can’t afford to live somewhere else,” she continued. “Maybe they can rent from their parents and then they can save money toward ownership.”