AMHERST — A draft housing production plan with a series of strategies to ensure there are sufficient housing options in Amherst for people with a range of income levels is suggesting Amherst produce 265 to 715 new housing units by 2030.

Presented Thursday to the Amherst Municipal Affordable Housing Trust by Tony Duong, a community planner with the Barrett Planning Group, LLC of Hingham, the still-in-draft-form plan, the town’s first since 2013, has set two targets for creating housing.

The low target is 265 housing units over the next five years, which would meet the minimum guidelines of the state’s Chapter 40B affordable housing law, while the high target would be either 696 or 715 housing units, numbers based on the 2,974 households in town that are considered cost burdened, meaning they are struggling to pay for their housing.

The last housing production plan produced 487 total units, with 226 of these affordable, or less than 80% of area median income, and 112 considered workforce housing.

Duong walked the members of the trust through elements of the document and its general themes.

One aim is to increase affordable housing options, which could be done by strategies that include updating the town’s inclusionary zoning bylaw to encourage more low- and moderate-income housing and creating a smart growth district under the state’s Chapter 40R law. Such a district would incentive mixed-use developments.

A second goal is to expand opportunities for housing choice, with strategies that could include upzoning some residential districts to create so-called missing middle housing, and might prompt cluster developments.

The draft plan also contemplates reducing public and financial barriers to housing developments, with strategies that include assisting developers in accessing public subsidies and supporting local housing organizations.

Finally, there is the need to manage the shifting demographic make-up of town, which has more college students and fewer families. This can be done through building more relationships with the colleges and University of Massachusetts, and what Duong said could be creating alternate living arrangements and home-sharing programs for seniors and students.

Amherst Housing Coordinator Greg Richane said when a final draft is complete, the Town Council and Planning Board would have to vote on it.

“This is a suite of strategies that we think will make an impact on housing,” Richane said.

If approved locally, then the state’s Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities would follow with its approval.

Richane said a favorable vote by the town boards won’t adopt any strategies recommended in the plan. Instead, the plan should be seen as a policy document and a way of framing conversation in town for zoning changes and other means of getting more housing built.

Committee Chairman Gaston de los Reyes said he would like town officials to have a chance to review the draft, especially if certain people will be charged with carrying out various recommendations in it.

Committee member Erica Piedade praised the draft document. “It’s very comprehensive, it’s pretty amazing, (and) it’s very idealistic in five years,” Piedade said.

That makes Piedade, though, worry that the goals could be difficult to achieve.

Committee member Carol Lewis said more specifics in the document would give the town the information to know precisely what should be done to meet the housing production numbers, such as what adjustments should be made to inclusionary zoning.

“Because Amherst has a million opinions about anything you want to think of, so having somebody have a real, concrete suggestion could be very helpful,” Lewis said.

Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.