Sound the Alarm

It’s tempting to say that, when it comes to the affordable housing crisis on the South Fork, the hard part is over — the heavy lifting that it took to get the Community Housing Fund approved in Albany, and by local voters in a referendum, was no small feat. Now that it’s in place, the money is flowing freely: Just a year in, both Southampton and East Hampton towns already have upward of $10 million to spend. For years, the lamentation was “if only we had the money …” Full marks to everyone who addressed that.

But an Express Sessions conversation held last week in Southampton Village, focusing on both towns and the status of the CHF and its impact on the existential affordable housing shortage in the entire region, made one thing clear: The hard part is yet to come. Or, rather, it’s now.

The panelists last Thursday included Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, East Hampton Town’s supervisor; Curtis Highsmith, who is executive director of the Southampton Town Housing Authority, which manages its affordable housing properties; and the two towns’ housing directors, Kara Bak of Southampton and Eric Schantz of East Hampton. Burke-Gonzalez is at one level, setting the course for implementing the CHF revenue; Bak and Schantz are the advisors who are tasked with providing guidance; and Highsmith is on the ground, putting the strategy in place.

Each of them appears to be on point: Everyone is doing his or her job admirably. But there was a nagging feeling that the CHF money is gushing in, and the pipes to direct it are still being constructed. Things are going to get wet, but maybe not guided with the precision of a fire hose, at least not yet.

Overall — and it’s fair to say that the crisis is regional in nature, though the solutions likely will be town-focused — there seems to be an absence of what President George H.W. Bush used to call “the vision thing.” While the arrival of funding is necessary to get started on solutions, and it will all begin to chip away at a monumental problem, it seems reflexive. There’s a nagging feeling that neither town really has a blueprint to get the most bang for its many bucks, and has analyzed the situation to determine where the money can have the biggest impact most quickly.

For example, the two towns already have plans to put in place down payment assistance. It’s a necessary element of any affordable housing plan, with a benefit of helping young people who might want to stay but simply can’t clear the hurdle of amassing a down payment that can leverage a mortgage. But for all the positives, this program will impact only a handful of individuals and families who can afford a mortgage for a property in East Hampton or Southampton towns — a very high bar.

In fact, the whole conversation of rentals vs. ownership is necessary. With the impact of teardowns and AirBNB, the entire infrastructure of affordable rental apartments has evaporated in the past decade. There is, frankly, no place for working individuals or families to live, and that’s arguably had the most far-reaching impact on everything from hiring to traffic. There’s no question that ownership is better for young people in the long run — but rentals are a more immediate need and can have a swift impact on the economy.

The reflexive nature is also driven by the need to find vacant land. But it’s time to see if there are new, creative ways to add housing to properties where there’s already been development. Single-floor retail developments? Shopping plazas? If pristine new building lots are scarce, start seeing opportunities in new places.

It’s worth remembering that when the Community Preservation Fund was adopted in 1999, there was already a brain trust in place: The Nature Conservancy and the Peconic Land Trust were able to midwife the nascent program and provide support until the towns were able to get their CPF staffs in place and trained. For now, there’s nothing comparable for the CHF.

It’s very early, and there is no reason for panic. But it’s time to sound the alarm: The house is burning, and there’s a ready supply of water both on scene immediately and on the way. Someone needs to take charge of the scene. The two towns, either together or separately, need to find a “housing czar” type of leader to provide vision, to be able to answer some of the questions and provide an articulate direction.

Elsewhere in our Opinion section this week, in Karl Grossman’s “Suffolk Closeup” column, he talks about the early days of Suffolk County’s farmland preservation program, and how the “wild and crazy” ideas for keeping the region’s agricultural roots nurtured led to the creative solution that was the CPF, and set an example for other communities to follow. The same kind of creative thinking, and the same urgency, need to be applied to the affordable housing crisis. The money is now there — the hard part is just beginning.