Posted by Susy Thielen on November 12th, 2009 — in Housing News, Monadnock Region Coalition
By Jessica Arriens
Sentinel Staff
Published: Saturday, November 07, 2009
Picture a middle school dance. Boys on one side of the room, girls on the other, everyone too shy to make the first move onto the gym-turned-dance floor.
In a sense, the relationship between young professionals and their elder counterparts can be thought of the same way.
Either side may want to participate in community initiatives, but their involvement won’t happen without a first step. Or: until somebody walks across that room, nobody dances.
Talk of how to take those first steps — and why they are important — happened Friday morning in Keene, at an annual Business Leaders Breakfast sponsored by Heading for Home, the Monadnock Region’s housing coalition.
Though the discussion hinged on the economic necessity of young professionals, much of it also centered on the necessity of their having affordable housing — something a community needs for a vibrant workforce to flourish in the first place, event participants said. Read the rest of this page »
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on April 16th, 2009 — in Housing News, Monadnock Region Coalition
By Jessica Arriens
Sentinel Staff
Published: Thursday, April 16, 2009
It’s not often that a tax map is so shocking it makes people gasp.
But when those maps show that in six years more than half of Keene’s workforce housing — housing stock that employed people in low- and middle-income brackets can afford — simply disappeared, otherwise mundane tax maps become unbelievable.
Put simply, “It’s a pretty significant decrease,” said Torin Hjelmstad, one of three Keene State College geography students responsible for the map, one part of a workforce housing study titled “May the Force be with you: Workforce Housing in the Monadnock Region.”
Hjelmstad, along with students Sarah Forler and Elizabeth Kane, presented the report to the public Wednesday night at Bentley Commons in Keene. Read the rest of this page »
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on April 6th, 2009 — in Housing News, Monadnock Region Coalition
On April 15, 2009, Heading for Home and the Keene State Department of Geography presented the report, “May the Force be with You: Workforce Housing in the Monadnock Region,” an original study comparing the changes in workforce housing availability in the Monadnock Region in 2001 and 2008.
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on April 6th, 2009 — in Housing News, Monadnock Region Coalition
By Jessica Arriens
Sentinel Staff
Published: Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Susan R. Thielen has heard the myths.
When people hear “workforce housing,” they picture derelict trailers, imagine an influx of children and cry out that such a move will cost them more in property tax dollars.
It’s all part of what Thielen, coordinator of Keene’s workforce housing coalition Heading for Home, calls workforce housing’s “image problem.”
“(People) want the younger people, they want the workforce, they want the viable tax base,” she said. “But they just don’t want their neighborhood to change.”
Whether towns like it or not, that change has come, in the form of a new workforce housing law, passed last year and set to take effect this July. Read the rest of this page »
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on February 3rd, 2009 — in Housing News, Monadnock Region Coalition
By Jessica Arriens
Sentinel Staff
Published: Monday, February 02, 2009
New Hampshire’s workforce housing law, passed this summer, has a grand goal: To fight the state’s affordable-housing shortage, and in turn create a productive, thriving workforce that can afford to live where it works.
Despite this lofty goal, the law — set to take effect in July — has caused communities across New Hampshire to struggle with meeting its web of new requirements.
“The law is difficult for communities to understand and comply with,” said Bruce D. Simpson, chairman of Dublin’s planning board.
To give these communities time to figure out what to do, state Rep. Peter R. Leishman recently helped sponsor a bill to delay the law for a year, until July 2010.
The Peterborough Democrat said he decided to introduce the bill after receiving a call from town officials in Sharon.
“They were totally overwhelmed by the (workforce housing law) due to their size and lack of resources,” he said.
“(They) didn’t feel they could get things together before July of this year.”
The law requires towns to ensure that land-use ordinances and regulations “provide reasonable and realistic opportunities for the development of workforce housing.” Read the rest of this page »
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on October 6th, 2008 — in Housing News
The Village at University Heights (Flagstaff, AZ) will have 10 two-bedroom condos priced as low as $149,000 for residents earning no more than $73,750 a year.
By J. FERGUSON
Arizona Sun Staff Reporter
Monday, October 06, 2008
Another local Flagstaff developer has answered the call from the community for more affordable housing options.
John Crowley has recently lowered the price of nearly 5 percent of his condo conversion units at The Village at University Heights by $30,000 apiece to help locals buy their first home. Crowley has created 10 permanently affordable units in the former apartment complex for Flagstaff residents earning between 80 and 125 percent of the area median income, which is currently about $58,000 for a family of four.
That means households earning between roughly $46,400 and $73,750 would qualify for Crowley’s condos.
Read the rest of this page »
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on September 24th, 2008 — in Housing News
Census: Housing costs eat up half of more than 7 million Americans’ incomes
By ADRIAN SAINZ
The Associated Press
MIAMI
Al Ray is so strapped for cash, the only time he eats out is on Wednesday or Sunday, when the local McDonald’s sells hamburgers for 49 cents.
Ray lost his engineering job last November, and has been working as high school tutor, scratching out about $1,000 a month — if he’s lucky. He struggled to make his $1,400 monthly mortgage payment and $330 monthly homeowners’ association fee until May, when he stopped paying.
Ray, 44, is looking for work and renting out a room in his two-bedroom condo in Davie, Fla., for $500, but his monthly income doesn’t match his expenses and he’s facing foreclosure.
“I barely have money to survive,” he said. Read the rest of this page »
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on September 4th, 2008 — in Housing News
By Casey Farrar
Sentinel Staff
Published: Thursday, September 04, 2008
JAFFREY — The Jaffrey Zoning Board of Adjustment has given a Rindge developer the green light on plans for a 28-unit development near Mount Monadnock.
But an opposition group, made up of local residents and the Society for the Protection of N.H. Forests, has vowed to take the matter back to court.
A ruling earlier this summer from Cheshire County Superior Court Judge John P. Arnold forced developer Robert B. Van Dyke to seek a variance from town wetlands ordinances for the proposed development between Cutter Brook and Stony Brook.
Arnold’s ruling meant the 28-unit development would have to be considered separate lots, each of which would be required by town ordinances to meet a 200-foot wetland buffer.
The zoning board ruled Sept. 2 that allowing a variance of the town ordinance would not be contrary to the public interest and a 50-foot buffer is more than adequate to protect both the brook and the pond.
“Neither the pond nor the brook are ‘public waters’ governed by similar state law or regulation,” the ruling said.
Opponents argue the development, which would have only 119 feet of shoreline frontage per unit, instead of the 200 feet required by town ordinances, should include only 11 units.
The variance includes four conditions, including a stipulation that residents of the development not use fertilizers or pesticides or other chemicals behind the buildings.
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on July 31st, 2008 — in Housing News
Committee looking at Evans Flats
By Casey Farrar
Sentinel Staff
Published: Wednesday, July 30, 2008
PETERBOROUGH — A 40-acre property known as Evans Flats is back in the forefront of town business.
Four years after voters trounced a proposal to sell a 4-acre piece of the land for a Stop & Shop, selectmen have formed a committee to determine the fate of the property.
The 10-member committee, made up of neighbors of the property and local leaders in construction, arts, recreation, finance, business and conservation, will have six months to come up with a plan for the land. Read the rest of this page »
No Comments »
Posted by Susy Thielen on June 2nd, 2008 — in Housing News
Keene Sentinel
Friday, May 30, 2008
As the legislative session in Concord comes to an end, I look back and see that we have much to celebrate.
During the past two years, we met the N.H. Supreme Court mandate by successfully defining an adequate education and identifying the cost. For the first time, we created legislation that promises to provide a quality education by first answering the question, what is important for our children to learn? Our next step was determining the cost of that education, and we did. This legislation provides every child with an equal opportunity to an education regardless of what school they attend and regardless of the wealth or the poverty of the school district. Next year is a budget year and I remain confident that we will transition our current funding system to a new constitutional one in the most fair and equitable manner.
We have passed legislation that benefits students in all phases of their education. Public kindergarten is now a part of adequacy, ensuring that young children will have access to the kind of early childhood learning that sets the stage for future academic success. I led the way for legislation that would guarantee safety in our schools. This legislation mandates annual fire inspections in all schools and provides a process of open communication between the community, the schools and the state. The goal of this bill is to address safety issues, to plan accordingly and responsibly. We passed legislation that helps college students by increasing funding for our community colleges and the university system. We also lowered interest rates on college student loans. A well-rounded education policy lends itself to a strong state economy.
In order to continue to provide economic viability and innovation in our community, I supported legislation that establishes research and development tax credits for businesses and reinstated our job training program. I pushed to increase the minimum wage and supported legislation that establishes affordable workforce housing. We also passed HealthFirst, an affordable wellness-based health insurance plan for small employers.
No Comments »
