Shape Oak Park’s proposed zoning changes and the SB Friedman feasibility study have highlighted that zoning alone does not produce new development. Other tools are needed to see changes in housing and affordability. Oak Park’s inclusionary housing ordinance is a tool that has remained at the forefront for nearly a decade and will be looked at again.
Neighborhood Services Director Jonathan Burch presented information on development in Oak Park and what the current ordinance has created to the Ad Hoc Housing Advisory Task Force at its first meeting on Oct. 19.
Burch then presented two preliminary options generated by village staff on how to change the existing ordinance to the Housing Programs Advisory Committee on Oct. 21 to get recommendations on proposed changes to bring back to the task force.
The main takeaway from both conversations being that development in Oak Park is extremely difficult and the current market and property taxes remain a large obstacle.
“It’s clear, no developments likely result from any of these changes because the market conditions say it’s not possible, it would really only serve as a safety net because market conditions change dramatically and quickly,” said Burch at the HPAC meeting. “But that safety net might be perceived as a negative by the development community, that would hear a message of Oak Park increases requirements when we’re already not economically viable to build.”
The inclusionary housing ordinance passed in 2019 and applies to developments with 25 or more units. It requires that 10% of units be set aside as affordable. Or, in lieu of that, developers can pay what is currently a $100,000 fee to the village for each required affordable unit. If adjusted for the consumer price index, the fee would be just over $130,000 now.
Although no on-site affordable units have been generated from the ordinance, about $4.7 million has been collected in fees for the village’s Housing Trust Fund. It was discussed by both HPAC and the task force that other forms of revenue for the trust fund need to be considered as new development to add to the fund remains unlikely.
Burch also highlighted Oak Park’s relatively stagnant development post-pandemic. Meanwhile Evanston has continued to develop, largely driven by lower property taxes and the demand for housing from students at Northwestern.
The HPAC members went through each requirement of the ordinance and discussed what they thought could be reasonable changes for the task force to explore further.
It was agreed that it doesn’t make sense to base the applicable geography on Transit-Oriented Development areas, condos should not be included in the housing types the ordinance would apply to, and offering a fee-in-lieu instead of requiring all on-site units is necessary. There were differing opinions on what the fee-in-lieu should be set at.
It was recommended that the task force should consider the affordable share rate between 10% to 15% and weigh options for reducing the number of units for developments that would fall under the ordinance anywhere from 7 to 20 or more.
The overarching question was raised for why changes should or need to be made when development is unlikely to occur as a result, and it could potentially keep development from happening.
“If nothing is going to happen with either of them anyway, then I personally think that you do nothing to it because we’ve seen how a conversation surrounding housing that, I obviously don’t think is going to do much, blows up,” said HPAC member Andrea Krieg at the meeting. “Don’t open the door to have like a vitriolic conversation about something that’s not going to do anything anyway.”
Committee Chair Keith Spencer said housing conversations and looking at tools like the inclusionary housing ordinance need to happen now in order to prepare for the future, and decisions being made are more about the impacts on the next generations.
“The decisions we make right now aren’t just affecting us right now,” said Spencer at the meeting. “There’s no reason for us to shy away from moving it forward and say that we’re having the shitty conversation if it’s going to fix stuff later on.”
Committee member Ryan O’Malley also highlighted the potential dangers of changing the zoning code without updating the ordinance and missed opportunities with future developments not being captured under the ordinance.
“Like if the Mohr site comes up available and stuff like that and if it’s not captured by those new forward standards, so therefore we’re already having one fight. This fight is a part of that fight. They’re not separate issues,” said O’Malley.
It was also asked of village staff to clarify what the end result goals are, and possibly setting an actual number for the amount of affordable housing to work towards as Oak Park is doing better with the affordable housing spread than other municipalities.
In Oak Park’s current housing supply using data from 2023, about 40% of rental units are affordable for residents at 60% of the area median income and about 63% of units are affordable to residents at 80% AMI. Of those rental units, about 54% are naturally occurring for 60% AMI and 69% are naturally occurring for 80%.
O’Malley raised a counter point that doing better than other areas that are doing bad, does not mean it is necessarily good. He said the “norm, like where we’re at is not okay,” and is concerned doing nothing to change with the market could cause Oak Park to become like its neighbors.
The recommendations from HPAC will be taken by village staff to the Ad Hoc task force for further discussion before any recommendations from the task force will be taken to the village board down the line. The next Ad Hoc Housing Advisory Task Force meeting is on Nov. 6, at 9:30 a.m. at village hall.