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Question 7 on “starter homes,” rejected by Massachusetts voters by a slim margin last week, attracted strong opposition in New Bedford’s suburbs.
The ballot measure, introduced amidst a statewide housing crisis, would have allowed single-family homes to be built on 5,000 square foot lots, if they were connected to water and sewer services.
On the South Coast, 66% of Dartmouth voters voted no, as did 68% of Westport voters and 56% of Fairhaven voters.
“We would much rather handle the zoning questions within our own town,” said Christopher O’Neil, vice chair of the Dartmouth Select Board.
Question 7 would have significantly changed zoning in parts of Dartmouth and Fairhaven, where the minimum lot sizes are 15,000 square feet or more.
In New Bedford, 53% of voters voted yes. Statewide, Question 7 lost 50.6% to 49.4%. Because of the close vote, the Associated Press did not declare the result until Friday afternoon, three days after the election.
Supporters argued that the ballot measure would have encouraged more housing construction. Opponents expressed concern that the question would remove zoning control from local communities.
Heidi Silva Brooks, chair of the Dartmouth Select Board, said that she was pleased with the results of the race because she was concerned that Question 7 would’ve strained local infrastructure.
“I didn’t think it gave enough support to individual municipalities,” Brooks said. “It was a one-size-fits-all.”
O’Neil said he believed Question 7’s proposed reform would have been disruptive to the housing market.
“Dartmouth has been way ahead of the housing crisis, and we’ve done quite a bit more than a lot of municipalities have done,” O’Neil said. He noted that the town implements cluster zoning, which he said reduces the size of lots and creates more open space.
Rep. Chris Markey, D-Dartmouth, did not believe that Question 7 was the best solution to incentivize more housing. He said that the Legislature has tried to make it easier for zoning changes to happen in rural and suburban communities.
“The tradition has always been that housing, zoning issues are left to the local communities,” Markey said.
Question 7 supporters disappointed
Andrew Mikula, chair of the Legalize Starter Homes ballot committee, said that he was disappointed with the results of the race, but acknowledged the divisiveness of housing and zoning issues across the state.
“It’s really difficult to get voters at a hyper-local level to vote to concentrate new development in their own neighborhoods,” Mikula said. “So, this was a way of kind of breaking through that collective action problem and allowing an incremental scale of development at a much broader level.”
Boston and its closest surrounding communities generally voted in support of the measure, while wealthier and smaller towns voted against it.
In Fairhaven, reaction to Question 7’s defeat was mixed.
Miles Grant, member of SouthCoast Places for People and a member of the Fairhaven planning board, said that although Question 7 was unsuccessful, he was glad to see so many voters call for major statewide reform.
“I think it’s something for our legislators to consider as they continue thinking about housing policy,” Grant said. “We had 49% of voters statewide vote for what would be a pretty radical change to our statewide housing policy.”
Grant said Fairhaven has a dense town center that would’ve benefited from the ballot measure as well as rural areas that want to maintain their character.
“I think the conversation folks should be having is, how can we best direct new housing to places that have the infrastructure and can most support it?” Grant said.
Andrew Romano, chair of the Fairhaven Select Board, said that it was unfortunate that Question 7 did not pass. He disagreed with the idea that it would take control away from municipalities when zoning ordinances still apply.
“If anything, it actually helped shift power back to the municipalities,” Romano said.
Fairhaven Town Administrator Keith Hickey said that he was not surprised by the defeat.
“I think that each community should be responsible for adopting their own zoning,” Hickey said. “The state was reaching too far on this one.”
Rep. Mark Sylvia, D-Fairhaven, voted against Question 7 because he was concerned that communities would lose local control over zoning.
Sylvia said that he is thinking of filing legislation to create an incentive program that would encourage municipalities to implement 5,000-square foot zoning. Or, he may encourage state officials to create such a program.
“I do think we need to be more focused on empowering communities to be more innovative, to try things locally that will result in more housing,” he said.
Edward Pacheco of Dartmouth, the representative-elect for the 9th Bristol District, said the language of Question 7 was very flawed. He argued it didn’t address root causes that prevent affordable housing from being built.
“We need to start giving control back to the communities,” Pacheco said. “Local authorities are much better suited than the state authorities are to tell a community where they should be building and how many houses they should be building.”
Jake McGuigan, vice chair of the Westport Select Board, said that Question 7 would not have had an impact in the town because it doesn’t have a public water and sewer system, but he believes that it is important to maintain local control.
“We understand our community much better than basically a blanket mandate,” McGuigan said.
Rep. Steve Ouellette, D-Westport, said that the ballot question was an unnecessary measure to push on local communities.
“If communities wanted that type of zoning, they could do it without being forced into it,” Ouellette said.
Rep. Antonio Cabral, D-New Bedford, said that he voted for Question 7, pointing to the state’s housing crisis.
“We’ll have to wait and see what might happen, if anything gets proposed legislatively or not,” Cabral said.
Director of City Planning Jennifer Carloni said that she did not feel like Question 7 was directed at cities like New Bedford, which has already been revising its zoning and dimensional requirements.
Carloni said that she supports local control over zoning, but believes that Question 7 served as a “temperature gauge” of the need for housing.
She also said that other communities need to acknowledge that the state’s housing shortage cannot be solved just by the state’s mid-sized Gateway Cities or just by places with water and sewer services.
“These communities need to be a part of the solution with us,” Carloni said.
Nicole Abrams is a journalism student at Boston University, covering state government for The Light as part of the Boston University Statehouse Program. Email her at nabrams@newbedfordlight.org.
