LEARN MORE ABOUT
Andrew Chalnick’s Campaign Priorities
LEARN MORE ABOUT
Andrew Chalnick’s Campaign Priorities
Housing
Home is where the heart is.
I am proud that during my tenure we’ve increased funding to the housing trust fund, boosted density where it makes sense, allowed taller buildings in City Center, halted short-term rental conversions and required that new construction include permanently affordable units.
Significant and far-reaching updates were made in 2024 to require permanently affordable housing, to increase total “missing middle housing” units, to allow for more flexible use of lots in South Burlington’s neighborhoods, to encourage mixed-use development, redevelopment, and infill and to allow more naturally affordable housing to be built.
Last, to encourage mixed-use development, redevelopment, and infill in South Burlington’s primary transportation corridors, primarily along Williston Road and Shelburne Road, we removed the lot size per unit requirement for large multi-unit buildings (13 units or more) in these areas and instead now regulate by the visual and environmental impact (by building height, building coverage and lot coverage). Buildings are permitted up to five stories in height and may be up to 7 stories through Inclusionary Zoning and/or Transferable Development Rights .
Short term rentals.
In 2024, we halted the conversion of housing to short-term rentals. Effective April 1, 2024, all residential rental units, including short-term rentals (STRs), must register with the city annually and pay a fee. STRs are now only allowed in owner-occupied units (where the owner lives on the property) or in accessory dwelling units (ADUs). Existing non-owner-occupied STRs have a four-year “grace period” to comply with the new rules, which will fully take effect by April 2028.
In 2025, we took steps to streamline and simplify permitting projects in and near our centers—exactly where we’d like to see investment — by approving a resolution requesting Tier 1B status for all eligible areas in the City (which excludes all areas that have been identified for conservation). Tier 1B status means projects up to 50 homes on 10 acres or less are exempt from Act 250 permitting and restrictions, up from the current threshold of just 10 homes.
We also increased the maximum allowed height of buildings in and around City Center from, generally, five or six stories, to 12 and 14 stories.
Looking to the Future – We need a Growth Management Plan
As of 2023, South Burlington had 9,921 housing units. In accordance with Act 47, the Chittenden County Regional Planning Commission has set housing targets for each municipality to reach by 2050. For South Burlington, these targets range from 3,788 new housing units at the low end to 11,378 units at the high end. The mid-range target stands at 7,583 new units by 2050. A discussion of these targets is here.
Historically, South Burlington has added approximately 175 new units per year. However, the new targets would require us to potentially increase that number significantly, with annual additions ranging from 152 (low) to 455 (high) new units. The mid-range target, 303 units per year, is about 1/3 higher than our historical average. In percentage terms, meeting the mid-range target would represent an annual growth rate of 2.3%.
These targets are the highesst for any municipality in Chittenden County, and are higher than the targets established for Burlington.
While the need for new housing is clear – and the City has made significant progress in facilitating new housing in the past three years – I objected to these targets. I said, and I continue to believe, that before agreeing to growth targets we owe a duty to our current residents, and it is imperative for us, to develop a growth management plan. The plan would help us figure out what we want our City to look like in the decades ahead, and how much/what type of growth is compatible with that vision. This plan would assess the potential impacts of different growth scenarios on the quality of life of our existing residents—taking into account factors such as traffic, noise, the strain on our schools, the pressure on our open spaces and the impacts to our water and air, and would have a much longer time horizon than our City Plan.
Without doing that work, meeting the mid and/or high targets could fundamentally alter the character of our City and experience of current residents. Only after we have established a clear vision and a thoughtful growth management plan should we move forward with adopting specific growth targets. The Council began a discussion here of developing such a plan, but there has not been consensus on what a plan would look like or its goals.