Redevelopment focus areas a screenshot from Imagine Nashua Comprehensive Master Plan. (Courtesy of Nashua Ink Link)
According to Community Development Director Matt Sullivan, Nashua’s new land use code should be in place by the end of 2025.
The goal of the land use code update is to align land use regulations and zoning ordinances with the vision of the city’s Imagine Nashua Master Plan.
One of the main focus areas of the Master Plan is land use and development with a top goal being to “promote redevelopment that is mixed-use, multimodal, and sustainable in targeted areas with access to transit, infrastructure and amenities.”
This means amending land use regulations to allow for more permissive and clear regulations in identified areas of the city suitable for growth, development, and increased density.
“Every section of the city we have a little bit of a different vision, but really the Amherst Street corridor, Daniel Webster corridor, downtown, and East Hollis Street, those are going to be our focal areas,” Sullivan said.
With the master plan having been formed in 2021, the purpose of the first round of Nashua re-CODE public input sessions last spring was to affirm the vision and values of the Master Plan for these areas as well as the city as a whole.
“Generally we found that a lot of the same community values and sentiments still exist to this day,” Sullivan said.
He added that more community engagement will be happening over this summer and fall.
Another part of the re-code is an update to affordable housing ordinances, which includes updating the 2020 housing study.
The study – a comprehensive look at the city’s housing stock and what could be done to add to it – was the “underpinning” for a lot of the housing work that has been done in the city over the last five years, according to Sullivan.
The city will be looking at ways to work with developers to incorporate more affordable units in development projects while still making the development profitable. While affordability is usually defined as 80 percent of the area median income, Sullivan said that other affordability levels are needed in the community.
“It is critical that developers remain profitable, quite frankly, or housing simply will not be built, and so finding the sweet spot for all those things that’s really critical,” he said.
As recommended by the study, the city established the Housing Trust Fund, now the Housing Revolving Fund. Over the last year, the city has received six or seven applications, and has recently awarded the Front Door Agency and Southern New Hampshire Hospital funds for housing related projects.
Southern New Hampshire Hospital was awarded $60,000 to start designing feasibility for the creation of workforce housing on their campus.
The Front Door Agency will receive $350,000 over a three year period to create a voucher in incentive program as a way to create trust between landlords and voucher-holding tenants.
According to Sullivan, this is a program that has been successfully implemented in several New Hampshire communities.
“If you’re a landlord, it’s critical to have stable tenants, regardless of who that tenant is and someone who’s going to produce rent and cover security deposit and all the things that sort of come with the regular tenant landlord relationship,” he said. “What we’ve seen over time is that those who are holding section 8 vouchers, or are otherwise not able to secure housing, are often looked at with a stigma by landlords. They think they’re not necessarily reliable or stable tenants, when in fact, they might be.”
The program will provide a direct payment to a landlord to accept somebody who has a voucher. The tenant will receive security deposit assistance, and there will be a small pool of funds that can be used on potential repairs.
“These monies are not necessarily because of who the clientele are, but what it really is is to guarantee to the landlord that if there is an issue, that there’s a financial backing system to help them cover any damage,” Sullivan said.
The city has entered an agreement to award and is currently in the closing stages. The Front Door Agency will hopefully get started within the next three months.
“It’s kind of a long game where we may not have the direct payment program many years in the future, but what we hopefully will have done is build this trust that will be critical in years to come,” Sullivan said.
This article is being co-produced by Nashua Ink Link and Granite State News Collaborative and shared with partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.
