Lawmakers in the state Labor and Housing Committee held a marathon public hearing on a major housing reform bill yesterday, which supporters say is necessary to meet the state’s housing needs and detractors argue challenges home rule.

House Speaker Ryan Fecteau (D-Biddeford), who sponsored the LD 2003 bill,  told the committee that the state needs to provide 1,000 new units of housing per year to keep up with growing demand. Maine produces a quarter of that on average annually, he said.

“We’ve been stuck in the mud at 250 for quite a long time,” Fecteau said.

The bill is the result of a year-long legislative study by a 15-person commission, completed in January, assessing how local ordinances can be an obstacle to housing development. Six of the bill’s provisions would not take effect until April 20, 2023, and directly instruct municipalities to accommodate housing, particularly affordable housing, by:

  • Forbidding the use of “character,” “concentration of the population,” and “overcrowding of land” as reasons to restrict construction of housing 

  • Banning growth caps on the local level

  • Requiring municipalities building affordable housing to allow higher dwelling unit density, up to 2.5 times, than normal local rules would allow

  • Requiring municipalities to permit up to four dwelling units per lot in residential zones

  • Requiring municipalities to allow accessory dwelling units anywhere housing is permitted.

  • Requiring municipalities to designate an area a “priority development zone” for housing, including affordable housing.

The bill also proposes establishing a Municipal Housing Development Permit Review Board on the state level. Anyone who is denied a permit for a housing project may appeal to the board, which may override local decision.

Finally, the bill also proposes creating a program totaling nearly $1.3 million within the state Department of Economic and Community Development to help communities that want to review or change existing local laws to accommodate future housing projects.

The public hearing lasted for nearly eight hours, and while many conversations and presentations focused on the bill’s finer details, supporters pointed out the ongoing need for more affordable housing statewide, including Alina Diaz, a single mother living in Jefferson. She told the committee she has relied on government assistance, including housing vouchers, while going to college to get an advanced degree. When the pandemic hit, her landlord sold the single-family home she was renting. 

The same thing, she said, was happening everywhere, leading to fewer rental properties available, and even fewer rental units for low-income tenants. Had she not rented from a family member, she said, she might have wound up homeless.

“In my situation, there were so few homes available in my area, that as soon as a few were sold to people outside of the community, there was nothing left for the people who had been renting here for years. With more people looking for homes that are available, landlords have been able to rent to the most established applicants, leaving community members with lower incomes out of the equation,” she said.

Even before the bill’s language was first drafted, detractors were already voicing concerns about the bill taking away local control. Kate Dufour, legislative advocate for the Maine Municipal Association, initially supported most of the study’s recommendations that led to the bill, but in its current form, she said, the language was too heavy-handed.

“It still sends a message that (local officials) can’t be trusted,” she said.

One of the committee members, Rep. Dwayne Prescott (R-Waterboro), openly criticized the bill’s challenge to local authority.

“The bill is clearly the heavy hand of government telling communities what they’re going to do,” he said.

Fecteau responded by saying the bill frees local residents from officials trying to prevent them from building. 

“To tell people that they can’t build (for example) an accessory dwelling unit on their property, that is government imposing itself upon people,” he said.

Prescott noted that local ordinances also represent the word of the people, but Fecteau countered that ordinances are usually not put in place by public referendum.

“Most of them are put in place by a governing body, and I think a lot of voices get left out of the room,” he said.

The committee will look at the bill again in a work session that has not yet been scheduled.