Quality Affordable Housing

The Issue: 

Housing is a fundamental human right. All people deserve safe, healthy housing they can afford in the community where they want to live. Unfortunately, for far too many people in Onondaga County, this is not a reality. There is a shortage of affordable housing, and our aging housing stock  burdens both renters and homeowners. In some communities, rising prices threaten to push people out. In others, a housing shortage keeps people out. The Pandemic has just made what was already a crisis even worse.

Practical Solutions:

Repair and reinvigorate existing housing. Years of deferred maintenance have left many neighborhoods with unsafe, unhealthy, inaccessible housing, and it will cost more than most families can afford to bring all these homes back into good repair. People need financial support to restore this housing while keeping it affordable.

Invest in energy efficiency while maintaining our housing. We can’t just repair our housing stock—we must also modernize it. Decarbonizing housing will improve long-term affordability while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Create more integrated communities. A lack of housing—particularly multifamily and affordable housing—constrains people’s housing choices and concentrates poverty. Illegal discriminatory practices such as refusing to accept vouchers or rejecting young families only makes the problem worse. We must build more affordable housing, end exclusionary zoning, and enforce Fair Housing laws in communities across Onondaga County.

End no-cause evictions in Onondaga County. Evictions are violent events that increase poverty and destabilize neighborhoods. Keeping people in stable housing improves public safety, health and educational outcomes. Ultimately, we need to pass Good Cause Eviction at the state-level, but we can take steps to protect tenants now by expanding eviction diversion programs and tenant protections in County-subsidized housing.

Use the Land Bank to create permanently affordable housing. The Greater Syracuse Land Bank owns many properties that are in a terrible state of disrepair, and few people can afford to spend the money to fix them up. Onondaga County can help bridge that gap by providing home repair grants and loans on the condition that the land beneath the building be placed in a Community Land Trust. This new model of community ownership allows families to achieve stability and build wealth while also insulating neighborhoods from rising prices by creating permanently affordable housing.