Building momentum
Policy solutions to expand housing supply, affordability, and quality of life
MHP has long advocated for state policy reforms that expand affordable housing opportunities and foster neighborhoods with a high quality of life. We are proud that our policy efforts have often sparked important conversations in Massachusetts and often led to adoption of new laws to create more homes.
For example, MHP’s 2014 report to the state legislature, Unlocking the Commonwealth, highlighted how the chronic lack of housing production threatened the state’s economy by suppressing potential job growth and encouraging the outmigration of talent to other states with lower housing costs.
Unlocking the Commonwealth made eight state policy recommendations, many of which were introduced as legislation. Several of MHP’s recommendations became law in some form: a multifamily zoning mandate, a new judicial mechanism to discourage frivolous land use appeals, and authorization for cities and towns to negotiate cross-border development agreements without state legislative approval.
While MHP is proud of these past policy reforms, we are also eager to build on that success and go even farther, knowing that the work is not complete. In August 2023, MHP published a new report, Building Momentum: New Housing Policies to Unlock the Commonwealth’s Potential, which picked up where our 2014 report left off. Building Momentum makes eight new policy recommendations and encourages bold changes in state policy to create a future where people can afford to stay in Massachusetts and make it their home. Recommendations encourage an approach that goes beyond increased funding for affordable housing and include reexamining state policies, eliminating local barriers to housing, rethinking the state’s approach to transit and infrastructure investment, wrestling down housing construction costs, reducing legal barriers to new housing and providing more equitable access to affordable rental housing. MHP’s objective is to present digestible data and policy recommendations so that everyone, from experts to policymakers to the general public, can be inspired to advance our conversations about housing.
A great example of MHP’s effectiveness on housing policy is the legalization of accessory dwelling units (ADUs) statewide. Following up on earlier work by the Pioneer Institute and Rappaport Institute, MHP did a deep dive on local ADU policies as part of the research team for the Greater Boston Housing Report Card in 2019. We found that while 108 cities and towns in Greater Boston allowed ADUs on paper, these bylaws and ordinances resulted in relatively little new housing because of the cost and difficulty of obtaining special permits. That MHP research helped make the case for legislation to allow ADUs “as of right” in every city and town in the Commonwealth. That approach was initially proposed by housing advocates and later embraced by Governor Healey in her proposed Affordable Homes Act, enacted by the legislature and signed into law in August 2024.
MHP’s policy leadership can also be seen through in the passage, development and implementation of the MBTA Communities law (also addressed elsewhere in this annual report) which requires multifamily zoning districts be established in every city and town served by the MBTA. The new law enacted in 2021 reflected one of the leading recommendations in MHP’s 2014 Unlocking the Commonwealth report. The law has proved to be more than just a means to jump-start housing production. It has also resulted in more constructive state and local conversations around housing density, walkable neighborhoods and proximity to transit. That kind of informed, constructive, data-driven debate is what MHP is all about.
MHP is proud to be a steward of strong housing policy and honored to be at the table when important policy decisions are made. Many challenges remain and we will continue to be a voice for universal housing access and affordability, robust communities and neighborhoods, and a rich quality of life for all residents of the Commonwealth.
LEARN MORE
Read the full Building Momentum report