Streamlining Housing Permitting in Arizona
Salim Furth at the Mercatus Center and Arizona attorneys Manjula Vaz and Cameron Artigue have put together a thorough review of the regulatory issues that slow down home construction in Arizona, along with a long list of recommended reforms.
Salim, along with Mercatus scholars Emily Hamilton and Charles Gardner also has a useful catalogue of potential reforms and a review of the progress that is being made, state by state.
The Urbanity Group at the Mercatus Center is at the leading edge of American housing reform, and they have some nice resources for considering and tracking the many attempts at progress.
The Arizona piece concludes:
Arizona builders continue to provide a steady flow of new houses and apartments. Their work has been an important outlet for unmet demand in California and elsewhere—but supply has still not kept pace with demand, and home prices have risen steeply in Arizona. As part of a long-term commitment to keeping homes within reach for Arizonans, cities and legislators should work together to clean the sand out of the gears and restore quick, clear processes for permitting new homes.
In some ways, the inability to build adequately since 2008 has not been under the control of cities and states. To a large degree, the decline in construction was a product of how sensitive the region was to the mortgage crackdown.
On the other hand, every municipality, with few exceptions, obstructs infill and multi-family construction relative to the need for it. In this way, Arizona lawmakers are at fault for creating the high inflation in housing costs over the past decade, but with few success stories to be compared to, such as Austin.
What this means is that the suggestions for Arizona probably apply to your region, too.
A recent article in the Boston Globe described how the state's recent ADU law has only resulted in slightly more than 500 units getting built. Local obstacles are still considerable, as several hundred projects failed to get a permit because the law isn't standardized across the state. It's disappointing, and the best we can hope for is more corrective legislation.
I did a good bit of research recently regarding how permitting and regulation has stifled building as a whole, making housing all the more expensive. Once again, the government getting in the way of people trying to improve their communities!