Pros and cons

          Before WWII Portland had a lot of duplexes, courtyards and so on. Tracy said this has been a slow process for the city but an important one as it addresses future land use.

The project is “a better and more equitable way” to address its housing needs and helps the city plan for how the housing stock will meet the demands of the population in the future.

There are benefits to the climate because more capacity for housing reduces driving distances and encourages walking, biking and using public transportation, reducing the carbon footprint. It also saves energy since the city is reducing the square footage, requiring less heat. Tracy said Portland is still using a lot of coal.

Demographically, the plan increases the number of units for the mobility impaired and the city is asking that in a fourplex at least one unit be what he called “ADA light” — all on one level with a smaller square footage for older people, the disabled or families with small children. It will give people more options to stay in their neighborhoods and still meet their housing needs.

Affordability-wise, Tracy said there’s the saying that “the most affordable house is the one that exists today,” but since these
multifamily housing options weren’t allowed before, he’d challenge that statement.

He said looking at the Bay area there are two ways the city can go: it can create more opportunity houses and have more people living in apartments who may not want to be and create enclaves of very expensive homes, or it could allow more multifamily option residences. Tracy believed this would also help with racial inequality. If a sixplex is developed, the city may ask that half of the units be available for low-income residents.

As for cons, Tracy has heard concerns, including there won’t be an availability of single-family homes, but they already exist. There are about 130,000 of them now. There were also concerns about canopy and open spaces being affected, but he said there are already existing codes to protect those things.

He added it doesn’t completely solve the housing crisis, but it is one tool to help.

Lessons learned

          Tracy would advise other communities to “get it done fast” as the length of the project has been a real challenge. Portland started the project under a previous mayor and council and now primary season is coming again. He also cautioned to “beware the scope!” Portland’s project started out very straight forward and expanded in multiple ways.

Portland first developed a stakeholder’s advocacy group with people from all parts of the city and several organizations, including developers, homebuilders, historical society representatives, senior citizen advocates, etc., and this group met monthly for over a year. The first meetings were more about educating everyone on the background of zoning in the city and where it wanted to go.

The stakeholder’s advocacy group brought people with very different viewpoints together — even those who usually tend to be adversarial — and was very helpful.

“It helps to have strong, bold leadership and community member support,” he said, adding he’s very thankful for all the staff in different bureaus and agencies who’ve been a part of bringing this together.

Tracy feels fortunate to have assets in-house like demographic experts, economical planners and historical experts. He advises if a city doesn’t have those assets at hand, it should reach out and develop those relationships.

Portland is “rounding the final corner” on getting this policy on the books. It just needs to hold those two public hearings so he expects as soon as full city operations are restored those meetings will happen.

Portland’s Residential Infill Project creates more affordable housing

          “Going back to housing costs, average sales prices for new construction are about $239 per square foot,” Morgan Tracy, project manager for Portland, Ore.’s, Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, noted.

• Typical new houses are about 3,200 square feet = $765,000
• So the 2,500-square-foot house = $598,000
• Duplex units = $359,000 each, but the total building is about $718,000
• Triplex units = $279,000 each, but the total building is about $840,000
• Fourplex units = $210,000 each but the total building is about $840,000

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