NORTHAMPTON — With housing supply in the city still struggling to meet demand, the City Council is taking a new approach that has the potential to increase its housing stock by about 900 units.
On Thursday, the council unanimously passed an ordinance that would allow conversion of “historic accessory structures” such as garages, carriage houses and barns built before the year 1976 into residential living spaces. Seventy percent of the accessory structure must have been built before 1976 to qualify under the ordinance.
Under the terms of the ordinance, any qualifying accessory structure must be at least 200 square feet in size, and “character‐defining features” of the original structure must be preserved “to the extent feasible” when converted into residential use. The ordinance also waives minimum parking requirements for any conversion under 1,000 square feet.
“Accessory structures such as carriage houses, barns, and other residential outbuildings yield critical information about the City’s history of travel, neighborhood development, and everyday life, but are a vulnerable, at‐risk resource,” the ordinance states. “These structures require significant time and money to maintain, and allowing an additional use that brings in revenue for the owner makes them more likely to be preserved.”
Ward 5 Councilor Alex Jarrett, who co-sponsored the ordinance, told the council on Thursday that some property owners had already converted such structures without permission.
“We’d like to provide a legal and safe path that would meet [building] codes,” Jarrett said. “Clearly, there’s a demand for it.”
At-large Councilor Marissa Elkins, the other co-sponsor of the ordinance, said it was one of the things she “most enjoyed working on” during her time on the council. She is not seeking reelection in November.
“As it stands right now, all the incentives work against maintaining those buildings,” Elkins said. “It’s been a journey to get here, and I’ve appreciated everybody who’s in all the different committees and commissions that have looked at this and signed off on it.”
In an interview with the Gazette, Jarrett said the idea for the ordinance had come about after he had met with some constituents who had such structures on their property and wanted to convert them for residential living. Jarrett began talking about the issue with Elkins, and the two decided to co-sponsor an ordinance.
“We did a survey, we drove around and talked to different people, looking to see who had what,” Jarrett said. “We thought about it from the dual perspective of, let’s preserve historic structures and let’s build new housing.”
Crucially, Jarrett said, it also allows for structures closer to lot lines of a property, something which owners previously had been unable to do.
“1975 is the key date, because that’s when we adopted modern zoning in Northampton,” Jarrett said. “Before that, you didn’t have these limitations, so you could build something like a carriage house and you could live in it.”
The city has attempted to increase its housing supply over the last several years to help combat the cost of living, although not without controversy and difficulty. A proposed five-story, 54-unit apartment complex at the corner of Phillips Place and Hawley Street has drawn opposition from nearby residents, and an affordable housing development at the former Registry of Deeds building on King Street was recently announced after nearly two years of the city trying to market the downtown property for housing.
During Thursday’s council meeting, Ward 1 Councilor Stanley Moulton said that around 900 structures in the city met the qualifications under the ordinance, creating a significant increase of supply for residential buildings in the city.
“We’re giving people real options.” Moulton said. “We’ve received written testimony from property owners who have these buildings which have been unusable for them, and that this will unlock those.”
The plan to allow residential conversion of the structures also won the approval of the Northampton Historical Commission and the Northampton Housing Partnership, who submitted letters of support for the ordinance.
“Many historic accessory structures are demolished each year,” said Martha Lyons, chair of the Historical Commission. “Creating additional uses for these buildings can encourage adaptive reuse that would prevent their loss.”
Gwen Nabad, chair of the Northampton Housing Partnership (and a current city council candidate in Ward 1) wrote in a letter to the council that the ordinance was a “vital step” in creating more housing development in the city.
“We believe that this ordinance will not only help address the housing crisis by increasing supply and affordability but also serve the city’s goal of preserving historic structures,” Nabad wrote. “By allowing these buildings to be converted for residential use, it provides owners with a viable use and a source of revenue, making them more likely to be maintained and less likely to deteriorate into health and safety hazards.”