By Patrick Adrian
[email protected]
CLAREMONT — Regional planners told the Claremont Planning Commission last night that the city needs to have more flexible and adaptable zoning laws for housing construction, to meet long-term needs of a diverse community.
During last night’s housing study discussion, Steve Schneider and Olivia Uyizeye of the Upper Valley Lake Sunapee Planning Commission presented a short list of recommendations to make city zoning accomodate a broader variety of smaller or multi-unit housing options, as well as strategic approaches to improve the quality of existing housing stock.
Schneider said that the purpose was to “get the members thinking” about these topics to generate questions and key considerations.
“We certainly don’t want to reinvent the wheel or push something that wouldn’t be appropriate for Claremont,” Schneider said.
A life cycle of housing types
Schneider said that a sustainable community needs to offer diverse housing types for its long-term outlook, not only for the diverse needs of its community but because an individual’s housing needs change over a lifetime.
“There’s a life cycle of housing types,” Schneider said. “You start out in an apartment, maybe with a housemates or maybe by yourself. You transition to a starter home, a family home then to an empty nest home. Those are all diverse housing types and there’s a demand for all of those.”
The area’s aging population will likely drive the future need for more senior housing and smaller, economical living units, Schneider said. New Hampshire ranks among the fastest-aging populations in the country and Sullivan County ranks close to the top in the state.
These trends also cause housing challenges. Schneider said that many seniors are competing with young families for the same starter homes.
“But the empty nesters are coming with a lot more money than the first-time home buyers, because the empty nesters are coming with the equity from their family home to pay full price,” Schneider said. “Then all of a sudden the market goes up, and it prices out those first-time home buyers, and you don’t want that to happen because you lose the youth and families that the community needs to continue to grow.”
Scheider and Uyizeye recommended city zoning laws allow for more varieties of multi-unit housing, such as duplexes, triplexes and accessible dwelling units and smaller-sized individual units like tiny houses.
“You need to allow for a bit of experimentation,” Schneider said, “We’re not recommending this community to be a science lab for crazy experiments, but to allow for incremental changes.”
Preserving land and appearance
Several Claremont planning board members expressed concern about how to meet these housing needs without compromising the city’s rural look, or contributing to the city’s already high number of multi-unit residences.
Mayor Charlene Lovett said that the city already has a disproportionately high number of rental properties compared to neighboring communities, and that her interest is to balance them more with owned homes.
“I don’t know if there’s a best practice balance between rental units and owned homes, but when we start talking about adding to the number of rental units I get concerned,” Lovett said.
Commissioner David Pacetti expressed concern about a recommendation that mentions allowing for transitional housing. Schneider said transitional was a broad term for anyone moving from one point of their life to another, whether due to health issues, poor life decisions or other causes.
“It is something that is an underbuilt resource in the Upper Valley,” Schneider said. “There’s a need. But communities are cautious because folks need support systems to make sure that transitional housing fits. And that doesn’t always happen.”
Schneider said that Claremont, like Lebanon and White River Junction, Vermont, tend to get circled as locations for transitional housing because they have the social services, retail and amenities to serve a larger population.
While he is open to ideas to accomodate multi-unit or micro-homes in practical areas, Commissioner David Putnam said that the city also needs to be careful about parcelling its land in ways that contradict the city’s master plan.
“In respect to minimum lot sizes, one of our objectives was to preserve the integrity and overall look of our community,” Putnam said. “We really want to preserve the rural atmosphere and the land, so that complicates our growth patterns a little bit.”
Putnam said his biggest priority was to improve the quality and appearance of the city’s existing housing stock. In his conversation with local realtors, Putnam said that the poor appearance and quality of Claremont’s housing creates an image problem for the city.
Putnam said that he wants to pursue resources to help families in need to make improvements and promote the city’s dedication to improving the city to attract new growth.
Putnam said that he wants to create more resources and incentives to help property owners improve or repair their homes, and to use those initiatives — including the city’s ongoing effort to remove lead paint from older homes — to promote the city’s commitment to improving its homes to the outside communities.
“So that’s the goal,” Putnam said. “Now we need to talk about how to do it.”
The conundrum to Putnam is also where to begin.
“I think to get the momentum going the planning board, city council, city administration and others have to consistently make a statement about improving the image of Claremont,” Putnam said. “And to engage the community to work together.”
Putnam said that effecting real change is not simply putting rules and regulations on paper, but creating a vision of the town and momentum that the community wants to take part in.
As your daily newspaper, we are committed to providing you with important local news coverage for Sullivan County and the surrounding areas.