The Summit County Council may soon have new data to determine the community’s affordable housing needs. In 2006, a study revealed a pent-up demand that contributed to council approvals of over 700 affordable housing units.
According to Mountainlands Community Housing Trust Director Scott Loomis, a committee has been formed by the Summit County Council that includes residents and Summit County planning staff that is charged with creating a new needs assessment survey to identify specific housing needs in the area. Based on the previous survey, the County Council began requiring all new developments to provide workforce housing. But Loomis said that the old survey may have misidentified what kind of affordable housing was needed.
“The old survey did not identify what the pent-up demand was for, it just said it was there,” Loomis said. “We polled a certain amount of people from an income category that would qualify for affordable housing and asked them if they would buy a home. Eighty-eight percent of them said ‘yes’ so the data we used was that 88 percent of qualified people would buy a workforce-specific home. But really, do all of those people want to buy a house? Do they want to rent? Can they pay a mortgage?”
Loomis added that the new needs assessment study will identify residents’ income levels, if they have special needs, what kind of units they may want and if they are interested in renting or owning a home.
“We are taking our time in creating the new assessment because we do not want to create controversy with this one and want it to address the needs of the community,” Loomis said. “We are hoping this survey will point us in the direction of what we need to create and define if there is still the demand that was determined before.”
On Wednesday, the County Council told Loomis that the sooner the survey is available the better so they can begin incorporating it into their policy decisions.
According to Loomis, there are currently 575 affordable housing units that have been approved and an additional 152 affordable housing units that are in the process of being built as part of the Boyer Research Park at Kimball Junction.
“As the new developments are built, then I think there will be a need for all the affordable housing units to mitigate the effect of the projects,” he said. “But do I think there is such a demand that we are running behind? No.”
The needs assessment survey will be finalized by the committee and then given to the Snyderville Basin Planning Commission for approval and public input before going to the County Council. Loomis expects the survey to be completed and approved in two to three months.