CINCINNATI — Cincinnati City Council passed the Connected Communities zoning overhaul 6-3 Wednesday afternoon.
The council vote came after the city's Equitable Growth and Housing committee also passed the zoning overhaul 6-3 on Tuesday.
The legislation is now set to become law.
The plan is aimed at increasing housing supply near business districts and along major bus routes. The goal is to cut red tape so developers can build more "middle housing," units like duplexes, townhomes and small mixed-use apartment buildings.
The plan could change neighborhoods over time should developers choose to build. Nothing will happen overnight.
RELATED | What is 'Connected Communities'? Key vote for Cincinnati zoning overhaul
Supporters believe it’s a necessary step to support the city’s overall economic growth. While the city’s population is increasing, housing supply is stagnant.
Opponents believe the plan is a one-size-fits-all approach that doesn’t take each unique neighborhood’s characteristics into account.
Council members Scotty Johnson, Jan-Michele Lemon Kearney and Victoria Parks voted no in both the committee and city council vote.
"I’m all for development, but not with displacement," Johnson said Tuesday. "There are a lot of good things here, but we can make it great if we mandate affordable housing in this city."
Johnson and Kearney proposed a council task force to address "concerns" with the legislation’s approach to affordable housing, infrastructure needs, architectural design guidelines and green spaces.
Council member Reggie Harris is one of the sponsors of the Connected Communities legislation.
“We feel pressure every day we continue to face a severe housing shortage that is holding back our community and hurting people,” Harris said. “I know we have never been afraid to make decisions for the betterment of the city,”
Tuesday's committee vote came after three hours of public comment. More than half of the residents who spoke were against the plan. Many more commented in written form to the council prior to the meeting. Tuesday’s meeting followed a six hour planning commission meeting two weeks ago.
Residents from 51 different neighborhoods formed the Coalition for a Better Cincinnati. They wrote a petition protesting the changes and spoke before the meeting outside City Hall.
"A lot of the community engagement that went on was basically public relations," West Price Hill resident Todd Zinser said.
City administration in a presentation said, "Engagement has been robust over two years and was conducted in a variety of methods to reach a wider audience than usual."
The presentation said that while "Cincinnatians are generally supportive of the policies," they "did not want them applied citywide."
"We're moving too fast," said Dawn Johnson, vice president of the North Avondale Neighborhood Association. "Let's take some steps back and let's really figure this out. Let's really do this the right way."
"I bought my house in a neighborhood because it had a lot of character, a lot of history," Allen Krotah said. "This peanut butter spread zoning change is not it."
Mayor Aftab Pureval told the council committee that the current zoning code was "antiquated" and that it is "choking off our ability to create housing."
"It’s not about any other public policy goal other than creating more housing, investing in our neighborhood business districts, for supporting our public transportation, and making long-term changes to protect our environment and our climate," the mayor said.
He noted other city initiatives to incentivize housing growth will not be as successful if developers are not able to build the types of units necessary.
"This is a critical step, but it is not the silver bullet," Pureval said.
The changes reduce the number of zoning reviews required for developers to build.
Deborah Collins, chair of the communications committee for the Real Estate Investors Association of Greater Cincinnati, said cutting down on the time it takes for developers to get to the building stage should create more inventory.
"That will help the developers move … along faster and ultimately provide housing to our residents faster," she said. "The biggest barrier is time."
Residents in opposition to the plan said they are concerned that a shortened timeline could limit their ability to have a say in the changes in their neighborhoods.
But Mary Huttlinger, director of Government Affairs for the Realtor Alliance of Greater Cincinnati, said the zoning changes give developers more freedom to tailor project needs to the community.
"Developers aren't stupid. They're not going to come in and do something that the immediate community doesn't want," Huttlinger said. "The beauty of just simply focusing on zoning reform allows each of our 52 neighborhoods to embrace a developer's relationship with them and carve out their specific needs."
