Trying again with affordable accessory apartments
The affordable housing trust has revived a plan to allow affordable accessory apartments in Harvard, a plan the trust says is a low-impact way to meet state mandates requiring that 10 percent of a town’s homes be affordable to those earning no more than 80 percent of the county’s median income. The trust says it is a low-impact way to provide state-approved affordable rentals without having to build new homes. Harvard’s zoning bylaws already allow accessory apartments.
A similar plan approved at Town Meeting in 2007 failed when the home-rule petition associated with it was shelved by the state legislature in 2008. Proponents of the new initiative say that a simple grant program would serve as the incentive for homeowners to register their accessory apartments as affordable, or create new affordable accessory apartments. The 2007 plan proposed a tax incentive, dooming it to failure in the legislature, proponents surmised.
Affordable accessory apartments would be enabled by amending the existing accessory apartment bylaw. A hearing to discuss the zoning bylaw will be held at the Feb. 27 meeting of the Planning Board.
