The housing crisis in Massachusetts is getting the attention of state lawmakers who are brainstorming solutions to address the problem, including one state senator who believes religious institutions may be the answer
State Sen. Brendan Crighton, of the 3rd Essex District, is leading the charge on Bill S.1430 — the Yes in God’s Back Yard Bill.
The bill was heard last Wednesday in the Housing Committee after Crighton and State Rep. Andy Vargas filed it earlier this year, calling the state’s housing situation “absolutely a crisis.”
“We need more than 230,000 units by 2035,” Crighton said. “That’s an estimate that’s even been pointed out as low.”
With the search to find space, this bill would allow religious institutions such as churches, synagogues, and mosques to be able to convert their unused space and in some cases, unused land.
“There’s over 4,000 parcels of religious land that could be used towards affordable housing,” Crighton said. “So the idea is if we could remove some of the zoning challenges for faith-based communities they would much more likely get involved with housing.”
Pastor Kurt Lange at the East Coast Conventional Church in Lynn tells NBC10 Boston that there is a huge opportunity.
“Developers wouldn’t normally pursue a faith-based group because too many issues are involved,” Lange explained. “This type of removing of obstacles or a zoning change would allow developers to see this as an opportunity now.”
Lange showed NBC10 Boston 24 units in catalyst housing at the church, where construction was completed in just the last few months.
Lange is a lead pastor and now also a landlord of sorts — overseeing 24 units of affordable housing right above his place of worship, which is on the first floor of a four-story old mill building in downtown Lynn.
“When we purchased the building for worship spaces, eventually it became apparent that the third and fourth floor could be converted into housing,” he said. “They were underutilized space. We were using them for recording or storage, or different things like that. Nothing important.”
Each unit has 250 square feet of living space. It’s a project that took seven years to complete — not just because of the construction but also because Lange and the nonprofit they worked with, the Haven Project, had to jump through a few zoning hurdles.
“This project we had to get a zoning variance because there was both a worship space in here and housing,” he said.
“Thankfully the city of Lynn was welcoming for these type of projects but there are many barriers often for creating affordable housing just because of local zoning regulations,” Crighton said.
The bill Crighton filed would essentially move all of those barriers, he says.
Read the NBC10 story here.