Cape Elizabeth should plan to shine on under Maine's new housing law

Instead of paying professionals to advise our community how best to navigate Maine’s recently passed housing reform law known as LD 2003, the good people of Cape Elizabeth will be picking up the tab for another consultant to help “move our cheese” towards housing diversity from a “cultural perspective” as punishment for snubbing a project that would fleece taxpayers, degrade our town and line the pockets of bankers and Wall Street investors.

It’s part of a zoning reform movement lead by planners according to the article presented to our local officials this week by our planner along with a spreadsheet purporting to objectively compare the new state law with our local ordinance that’s riddled with erroneous legal conclusions and oozing with an agenda.

The new state law is intended to flood the market with a fresh supply of badly needed housing and will have major implications on the development of both market-rate and “affordable” housing, i.e. publicly subsidized multifamily housing projects. Most notably owners of single family homes will be allowed to create up to 2 additional dwelling units despite local zoning rules to the contrary.

The opportunity LD 2003 presents is especially huge in Cape Elizabeth where close to 90% of people own single family homes, the real estate market is sizzling, property values continue to sky-rocket and rentals fetch a premium. And guess what demographic to whom these opportunities would mostly flow?

Families with kids - many lead by women - make up 7 in 10 households in Cape Elizabeth overall. Dunham Court, the ridiculously expensive for-profit Section 8 housing project Cape residents sent to referendum before the developer pulled the plug was not suitable for families because 41 out of 49 units were 1 bedroom apartments, and it was not suitable for our local workforce because of the low income restrictions. Across the street from award-winning public schools would be a giant housing development not suitable for kids or teachers.

But shouldn’t we be like Scarborough and other surrounding towns where development is on steroids?

The response to the housing shortage in surrounding communities has been for the most part guided by an article written by another planner about the lack of multifamily housing projects in the state — and assumes without evidence that multifamily housing projects are good for communities. From this planner’s paltry report sprung hundreds of housing projects aided and abetted by real estate developers and bankers happy to slap up ugly buildings that serve as their publicly funded ATMs disguised as “affordable housing.” The public buys the land for the developer, builds the building, pays the rent and the taxes.

Cape Elizabeth’s growth rate is consistent with the state and the jury’s still out whether these large-scale behemoths of siding and asphalt in neighboring towns are “affordable” to taxpayers or good for anyone but the developer. The cookie cutter model crumbles under the evidence. Families and kids don’t get ahead in for-profit Section 8 housing. Bankers and developers get further ahead.

Despite news reports and gossip about NIMBYism in our pretty little town, families including low-income families are getting ahead in Cape Elizabeth. That’s why everyone wants to live here.

“Cape Elizabeth shows an opposite trend, with the rate of cost burden for lower-income households declining over time. This is partially explained by the town’s high rate of homeownership. Lower-income residents who have had the opportunity to buy into the Cape Elizabeth housing market have seen decreasing rates of cost burden; their mortgage payments comprise a diminishing share of rising incomes, and long-time residents have been able to pay off their homes.” See Volume 2: Housing Data

Contrary to the ruse that a for-profit Section 8 housing project is medicine we have to take, what we really need to harness the power of LD 2003 is removal of the regulatory burden at the local level that serves as the main impediment to realizing the vision of the Comprehensive Plan and reaching our housing goals.

How many dwelling units can reasonably be expected to be developed privately by Cape families as a result of LD 2003?

Should a property owner adding one additional dwelling unit within her existing structure plus an additional detached dwelling unit pursuant to section 5 of the new law be subject to site plan review and the stranglehold planners with sweeping authority currently have on development?

These are the questions we should be addressing with the assistance of experts. Spare us woke nonsense and shoddy analysis. Don’t drag us into a “movement” to fix what’s not broken.

Instead let’s fix the site plan review process that is an abject failure. Just look around the town center of Cape Elizabeth. Why, still, the vacant lot next to town hall? Why was Ocean House Commons approved without adequate parking? It’s a process that’s opaque and expensive and gives way too much power to a planner paid by taxpayers but not accountable to them. Nobody is happy with the process - not the citizens who spent years drafting a Comprehensive Plan for a thriving town center that has yet to materialize, not the business owners knit-picked ad nauseam, nor the taxpayers who foot the bill for “reform” against their interests. Instead of working to unshackle the public who pay their salaries, in the name of “housing equity” and a reform “movement” planners push elected officials and citizens to accept whatever consultants and developers dish out.

“You have to pay a developer to build and administer a bloated government housing program your town doesn’t need or want,” they say pointing to their spreadsheets and memos.

No, we don’t!

“Because you are racist, you should hire a consultant to facilitate the movement of your cheese.”

This is not all hyperbole. I was accused of racism by “progressive” housing advocates — all of them white — for opposing Dunham Court. A consultant did say if hired she would move my cheese.

What’s racist is the assumption that people of color support for-profit Section 8 housing. What remains a mystery is what moving cheese has to do with any of it.

What Cape Elizabeth is doing now is lifting families upward towards long-term economic security. This includes affordable housing neighborhoods like Colonial Village with a mix of low, moderate and market rate homes for rent and ownership plus the mandatory affordable housing requirements for all new developments. What we need is solid, objective advice from professionals without a social or financial agenda to help us do more of what is already working, not jump on the band wagon of “the zoning reform movement” towards for-profit Section 8 housing that enriches the already rich.

We can and should leverage the opportunity LD 2003 presents for the public over corporations and bureaucrats based on the needs and values of our town. Action items include (1) streamline the permitting process for homeowners who want to develop housing and ADU’s by eliminating the costly and time consuming site plan review process, (2) assess the feasibility of Community Housing since close to 10% of voters support the idea, (3) determine where if anywhere large-scale publicly subsidized affordable housing developments are best suited, and (4) repeal the “Town Center Affordable Housing Amendments” either at the polls in November or by a vote of the town council, or both.