PHOENIX — A Phoenix city leader is pushing for bold changes to tackle Arizona’s housing crunch.
Vice Mayor Ann O’Brien has introduced a plan aimed at speeding up home construction. Her proposal includes zoning reforms, policy updates and legal changes at the city, state and federal levels.
The plan identifies supply as the key issue. It points to rising demand in the Valley and lingering effects from the Great Recession.
“There’s a wide variety of ideas here,” O’Brien told KTAR News 92.3 FM. “It is all of them working together that will help us get out of this hole.”
Vice mayor shares plans for Phoenix housing solutions
O’Brien said she wants to create a completely new plan for housing in Phoenix. Here are some of her goals:
- Advocating for a state law requiring cities to invest in homeless services.
- Banning source-of-income discrimination statewide.
- Increasing the Phoenix City Council vote threshold to deny affordable housing projects.
- Reducing the liability window developers face when building condominium projects.
- Improving communication between city, county and industry leaders.
- Studying the use of AI in city planning.
- Considering city-owned sites that could be used for housing.
Overall, the proposal builds on Phoenix’s “Housing Phoenix Plan,” which launched in 2020 with a goal of creating or preserving 50,000 homes by 2030. Phoenix reached that milestone toward the end of last year.
“To build on Phoenix’s housing plan, we need ideas that are local, regional and statewide to ensure we have housing for the people who live and work here,” O’Brien said.
Leaders need help finding Phoenix housing solutions, she says
In 2022, the Department of Housing in 2022 reported that Arizona had a 270,000-unit housing shortage.
O’Brien said Phoenix alone can’t solve that shortage, which is why she’s advocating for a state law requiring cities to invest in homeless services proportionate to their population.
“It’s important for all of the cities to have a stake in helping their residents,” she said.
Her proposal also calls for implementing state laws modeled after successful policies in other states, such as Florida’s Live Local Act, which makes it easier to build multi-family housing in areas not currently zoned for it, while California’s speeds up permitting for small housing projects.
“When you have areas where you’re cutting out some of the red tape, it gets houses to the market quicker,” O’Brien said.
The full plan includes many other ideas, which can be read in detail here.
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