A Philadelphia City Council committee has approved a bill designed to increase the city’s supply of affordable housing, moving the measure one step closer to becoming law amid opposition from Mayor Cherelle Parker’s administration. Introduced in February, the bill proposes a charter change to ensure that 100% of the “payments in lieu of providing affordable housing” developers make through the city’s Mixed-Income Housing Bonus Program go to the Housing Trust Fund, which is used to create and preserve affordable homes. Between 2019 and 2023, the program generated more than $43 million intended for the trust fund, but only a portion of that total has made it there. The rest went directly to the general fund. Launched in 2018, the mixed-income program enables developers to increase the density of their projects beyond the base zoning — whether that means more units or floor area — by either building price-restricted affordable housing or paying the city. Read more at WHYY.
Source: WHYY; 5/21/2024