It is the summer season again, the “Fudgies” are back and the roads, waterways and bike paths are busier than ever. Leelanau County is a popular place to live, recreate and visit. People will always come to Leelanau County. How can we balance the rural nature of Leelanau County and embrace the much needed housing and economic development? I keep hearing that people want housing and development to blend into the character of the community, but our community has so much character, how does one decide what the ‘Character’ is? We still have so many showing up against opportunities, but where are those showing up FOR the opportunities? We need to build a coalition of the YES we want this in our community crowd. The YES for housing people!
It’s exciting what is on the horizon and this is an opportunity for the “Land of Delight” to get on board and make strategic changes to embrace housing and economic development for everyone, not just those who can afford to live here. With land prices rising and the cost of construction not really getting any lower, we need to rely on our government and private partners to collaborate. One of the ways to do this is to create requests for proposals to attract developers to land that is publicly owned and designated for housing. Another way is to create incentive policies that attract developers to build the housing types needed, ensuring it will remain affordable for at least 12-30 years depending on the tool/opportunity. The incentive policy would give options such as reduction in hook up fees or property taxes to help make a project pencil out and be affordable to the year round residents.
We are seeing smaller square footage home designs which could be used for cottage courts or communities with smaller units and shared open space. We have modular designs that fit the characteristics of the community and can be brought in quickly once the site is prepared. What about designs for year round housing that are densely spaced and smaller in size to meet the needs of smaller household sizes. I encourage you to do some research and see what other nearby and farther away communities are doing. In the City of Kalamazoo they have a program with preapproved plans for housing that helps to streamline the process and make way for opportunities. In Frankfort they are encouraging Accessory Dwelling Units and cottage courts with new districts that provide property tax abatements for up to 15 years to keep housing affordable.
