Zoning reform bills set stage for loud public hearing
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Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios
If recent community meetings are any indication, the Metro Council is in for a doozy of a hearing at its meeting Tuesday night.
- The public will have a chance to weigh in on a series of zoning reform bills, pitched as tools to thoughtfully increase density and add more middle-class housing.
Why it matters: Nashville is in the midst of a very public, and sometimes contentious, debate about how to address its housing crisis — particularly the issue of the "missing middle."
- The question is how to implement policies so that middle-class residents like nurses, firefighters, new tech workers and electricians can afford to buy a home here.
Friction point: On one side are housing advocates, who say the city needs to act quickly and ambitiously.
- On the other are neighborhood preservationists, who are skeptical that the plan being offered will do much to address the problem and want to protect their residential areas.
The intrigue: Planning official Greg Claxton says Nashville has historically been good at building two kinds of housing: single-family homes and larger apartment buildings.
- Smaller multi-family developments, like townhomes or cottage courts with between two and five units, are rare here, Claxton's research shows.
Zoom in: Supporters of the zoning reform plan hope to increase density and give housing options to middle-class residents.
Here's an overview of the four parts of the plan:
✍️ Add zoning classifications: Two new zoning classifications would be created. The new categories allow for more density, but planners say they come with better design outcomes.
- The new RN and RL categories would follow the normal rezoning procedure
📏 Limit residential building heights: This plan reduces the maximum height for buildings in residential zones from three stories to two-and-a-half stories (35 feet).
- The goal of this part of the plan is to crack down on tall and skinny houses.
🏘️ Allow more detached accessory dwelling units (DADUs): This bill would allow more Nashvillians in residential areas to build DADUs (like a mother-in-law suite above a garage).
- The new unit could not be used for a short-term rental. Only about 1% of houses currently allowed to have DADUs have built them.
🏗️ New housing incentive: For developers that utilize the new zoning classification residential limited, they could take advantage of a new state-enabled incentive allowing taller buildings for dedicated affordable housing units.
Context: The policy debate for how to fix this kicked off last year when Metro Councilmember Quin Evans Segall filed a series of bills to address the missing middle housing options. Her plan included a drastic measure, which would have allowed developers to build dense housing in urban neighborhoods.
- The proposals earned tremendous pushback and were put on hold so the city could conduct research, called the housing and infrastructure study. The results of that yielded four zoning reform bills, which take a lighter approach compared to Evans Segall's.
In the room: The Planning Department and Metro councilmembers held smaller neighborhood meetings throughout Nashville in recent weeks. City leaders tell Axios they are trying to push back against misconceptions about the reform bills.
- During a community meeting in Crieve Hall last week, one of the first comments came from a resident who immediately compared the proposal to last year's plan from Evans Segall.
- Metro Councilmember Courtney Johnston jumped in to assuage the concern. She said the new plan is different from last year's proposal because it requires a council member to pursue a rezoning.
What she's saying: "If these bills pass, nobody's property is rezoned by these bills," Johnston told the crowd. "I talk to so many people who say, 'I don't want my property rezoned.' I had a call today about this. This is not rezoning your property."
- When Johnston asked the crowd if that "lowers the temperature a little bit," many responded no. While the Crieve Hall residents said they trust Johnston not to pursue a rezone, some said they fear a future council member might do so.
The other side: At the same meeting, a woman told Johnston she backed the bills. The woman, who said she is a pastor and her husband is a social worker, described the difficulty of trying to buy a house in Nashville.
- She said the kind of townhome the plan hopes to allow would be the perfect fit for her family.
What we're watching: An opposition group called Save Our Nashville Neighborhoods formed in response to the bills. The group spelled out its concerns about stressing infrastructure and ruining the character of beloved neighborhoods on its website.
- Multiple sources tell Axios the reform bills probably have enough support to advance at Tuesday's council meeting.
- With legitimate questions still percolating, along with the loud opposition, the bills could be deferred to allow for more debate.