Has Austin Become the NIMBY Capital of Texas?

On a Tuesday night in May 2022, an hours-long Austin Planning Commission meeting became a tense standoff between protesting activists wielding colorful signs and local homeowners armed with PowerPoint slides citing their objections. As committee members on the huge, wood-paneled dais presided, public commenters sparred back and forth, and a room generally mired in mundane bureaucracy became a battleground that epitomized the crux of Austin’s deepening housing crisis. 

The meeting had the misfortune of taking place on May 24, the day of the Robb Elementary mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Nerves were frayed. Some who spoke that night referenced the tragedy in their remarks.

The project in question, a building on East 39th Street to be called Cady Lofts, is meant to serve as supportive habitation for 100 single adults, some of Austin’s most vulnerable citizens who might otherwise go homeless. Developers, community social-service advocates, and some area residents, flanked by protestors brandishing pointed rhetoric on posterboard—“BUILD CADY LOFTS!” “PERMANENT SUPPORTIVE HOUSING CAN’T WAIT”—spoke in favor of an immediate zoning change, from single family and mixed-use residential to multifamily residential land use. 

João Paulo Connolly, executive director of Austin Justice Coalition, argued that the case was too urgent to delay; it would prevent citizens from living in unsafe, unsanitary conditions that drastically lower life expectancy. “To live on the street is like living in the 18th century,” Connolly said. “This is not simply a postponement discussion. This is a life-or-death discussion.”

But two groups, the Hancock Neighborhood Association and the Central Austin Neighborhood Planning Advisory Committee, clamored for more research on risks that the project might present to their community, and a contingent of area residents turned up with statements of opposition to poke holes in the plan. During the public comment portion of the meeting, one neighbor remarked on the dearth of ADA-compliant sidewalks in the area and called the plan “negligent at best.” Jennifer Dillahunty, a 21-year resident of the Hancock area, said the area is “not an elitist neighborhood, and we are for affordable housing. This feels a little bit like a rushed kind of experiment.” 

HNA’s statement complained that the project wasn’t a fit for the neighborhood and alluded ominously to what an influx of these new residents could mean for the safety of the current populace, conjuring visions of some unknown bogeyman. Increased congestion and lack of parking were also mentioned.

These types of scare tactics, packaged as practical concerns, are default talking points for NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) neighborhood groups that oppose new affordable housing development in Austin and beyond.

Just before a unanimous commission vote approved the rezoning recommendation to send to the Austin City Council, Megan Lash, one of the principals on the project with Saigebrook Development, LLC, sounded as if she’d tired of the same repeated NIMBY grievances. “I support affordable housing, just not in this location,” she intoned wearily. “I wish I could tell you how many times I have heard that throughout the course of my career.” 

The Hancock Neighborhood Association, perhaps acknowledging that it was not going to win its fight, backed off on most of its Cady Lofts opposition a week after the planning commission meeting. But it’s just one fight among dozens of cases that affordable housing experts say are slowing down progress as the crisis is exploding.

The case of Cady Lofts, and the back-and-forth that has beset its slow resolution, mirrors a bevy of similar efforts attempting to make Austin accessible to more people. A huge growth spurt in new, affluent residents and economic prosperity has triggered raised rents, real estate prices, and salaries for many years. Now, that skyrocketing cost of living has locals facing housing insecurity or even homelessness—Austin is reaping what it sowed. 

No matter how beneficial, affordable housing projects typically induce legal disputes and planning-commission fights. NIMBY challenges, however, tend to emerge when these propositions enter more affluent areas of town where area homeowners have the time and resources to weigh in. 

While these NIMBY groups may be well intentioned—hoping to preserve the value of their home investment—their comparative entitlement tends to give these struggles a David and Goliath vibe in progressive-posturing Austin. Yet they happen again and again. 

In planning stages, NIMBY factions can have outsized influence in blocking or even legally challenging zoning changes that some affordable housing projects are pursuing, stymying the shifts needed to move forward. NIMBY groups often cite crime risks as well as hits to housing values for existing neighborhood homeowners, and the perception that these new constructions will be community eyesores, blocking Texas sunset views with multi-story builds.

“If we have to fight this kind of uphill battle for every hundred units of supportive housing we build,” says Connolly, “we’re never going to get anywhere near these goals we have for ending homelessness or meeting our affordable housing blueprint.”

Walter Moreau, executive director at Foundation Communities, which creates and maintains supportive housing projects in Austin, has dealt with about a dozen NIMBY crusades over the years, only one of which ended up in court. “The main concerns we hear are, ‘There’s going to be crimes and drugs. It’s going to be ugly.’ But the heart of it is: ‘I don’t want those people living near me.’”

Affordable housing advocates try to counter a public perception problem, pointing out that fears about increased crime and falling property values rarely hold up to scrutiny. But some groups still pump out misleading information to residents who don’t have the time to embark on their own research. 

Sometimes, those neighbors need to see an example of what’s to come in order to reassess their opposition. “We’ve done tours, and I think folks are always surprised by who lives in affordable housing,” says Mandy DeMayo, community development administrator for the City of Austin. “It dispels the myth of what public housing actually looks like.”

Falling Through the Cracks

Every Thursday at 10 a.m. at Spring Terrace apartments, it’s Coffee Hour. On Nov. 17, Rev. Angela Michael has come upstairs from her subsidized efficiency apartment to enjoy some of the cake, biscuits and gravy, and fruit. She’s going to take some of it back to Puzzles, her 5-year-old Maine coon. 

“He was the runt of the litter. He could fit in the palm of my hand,” says Michael, 58, showing a photo of the cat on her phone. 

Puzzles came along just before she moved to Spring Terrace in 2017, when her rent at an apartment complex in South Austin unexpectedly spiked to $1,700 a month. Michael is disabled; she suffers from bilateral spinal stenosis, and her monthly Social Security stipend stagnated at $1,011 for years. A cost-of-living adjustment (“Thank God for COLA,” she says) recently raised that income to $1,099—still a far cry from what any Austinite could live on six years ago or today.

“I was hopeless. I had no place to go, and the email came up asking if I was still interested in Spring Terrace. I couldn’t believe it,” Michael says.

Similar to the prospective Cady Lofts project, Spring Terrace is one of seven supportive housing communities serving single adults in Austin that’s run by Foundation Communities. The nonprofit employs some of its residents to work on programs like the weekly Coffee Hour and provides access to services that many of its at-risk residents need, such as health, education, and financial-stability programs. Subsidized rent prices are currently $505 to $966 depending on the units, which are 256 to 509 square feet, with a $29 application fee and $100 deposit. All utility bills are paid for residents, and the apartment building includes a food pantry and community kitchen.

It’s the kind of Austin housing that those at risk for homelessness desperately need, but there’s not nearly enough of it. Building new units, converting existing hotels, or renovating apartment buildings into permanent residences serves as a safety net for the city’s most economically vulnerable residents. However, they can take years to build, and waitlists for available units stretch out six months or more.  

This type of construction constitutes only one spoke in a complicated wheel of Austin’s ongoing affordable housing crisis. For every low-income resident such as Michael, there are tens of thousands of middle-income Austinites who are also being priced out of the market. 

In November, Austin voters passed a $350 mill-ion affordable housing bond package with about 71 percent of voters supporting the measure. The bond provides money to supportive housing initiatives, buying land and subsidizing the building of new homes, and repairing existing homes for low-income residents. It was the most recent of four similar bonds totaling $55 million in 2006, $65 million in 2013, and $250 million in 2018. Just as the November 2022 iteration was passing, the last of the 2018 funds were being allocated by the Austin City Council to projects including low-income rental units.

All of these measures are meant to help counter rising rents and unattainable mortgages (with interest rates recently increasing), but local experts say the money still isn’t enough.

“We’ve made a lot of progress, but it’s really just a drop in the bucket compared to what’s needed,” says James May, housing and community development officer for the City of Austin. In addition to buying and developing land, the city has also tried to incentivize affordable housing with a density bonus program and an initiative called “Affordability Unlocked,” which offers waivers in exchange for designating half of a development’s units as affordable. Cady Lofts, for instance, is one project that couldn’t happen without that program. 

Supportive housing like Spring Terrace is still needed for those at risk of homelessness, but much of Austin’s attention to the housing crisis has been focused on homes that fall under the term “affordable housing.” That’s structured for those with a household income that falls at a specified fraction of Austin’s median fixed income. Those types of single-family houses or apartments are not being built quickly enough for residents who can’t contend with the current market.

May says the city is working to accelerate the timeline for affordable and supportive housing projects. Terrace at Oak Springs in East Austin took nearly a decade to complete and made 50 furnished new units available to support residents dealing with homelessness, mental illness, or substance abuse. Another, Espero at 1934 Rutland Drive, required about three years and created 171 units that are set to become available in early 2023. 

In affordable housing, sticker shock is the bigger issue. The median family income for the Austin-Round Rock area was $110,300 as of 2022, juiced by competitively high pay for tech jobs and high-income families moving to the area. Surprisingly, that high mark means that a family of four in Austin making $88,250 is now considered at the higher edge of “low income” for the area. Without debt, that family could afford a $342,000 mortgage, but couldn’t come close to tackling the $601,250 median home price in Austin, as of November 2022.

Families once considered middle class or better—teachers, firefighters, and nurses—must seek places to live outside of Austin, often a lengthy commute away from their jobs. The only other option is to desperately hope that some type of affordable alternatives becomes available before it’s too late. 

Read Enitre Aritlce Here: https://www.austinmonthly.com/has-austin-become-the-nimby-capital-of-texas/