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The thing about most other states is they have larger county governments to help pay for things like school and road upgrades to accommodate the growth, and spread the costs among a larger area and population. In the short term there is almost no incentive for these stuffy metro-west suburban towns to increase their housing, as almost everything falls on local property taxpayers.
It costs upwards of $10k/year/kid (probably closer to $15k). Any residential development that doesn't bring in at least that amount of money is going to be a net loser for a town. I live in a big house and pay A LOT in taxes and when both of my kids hit the school system, I will not be paying enough to cover what it costs to educate my kids. An apartment complex full of kids is going to be a net burden on a town's budget. Someone with two school-aged kids might not even cover the cost of educating with their rent, much less their property taxes.
Until the school calculus is changed in some meaningful way, towns will almost always oppose these sorts of developments. It's impossible to fight math. I'm sure there's some NIMBY-ism involved, too, but you don't need any to explain what happens with affordable housing (NIMBY-ism does a much better job explaining opposition to commercial development).
It costs upwards of $10k/year/kid (probably closer to $15k). Any residential development that doesn't bring in at least that amount of money is going to be a net loser for a town. I live in a big house and pay A LOT in taxes and when both of my kids hit the school system, I will not be paying enough to cover what it costs to educate my kids. An apartment complex full of kids is going to be a net burden on a town's budget. Someone with two school-aged kids might not even cover the cost of educating with their rent, much less their property taxes.
Until the school calculus is changed in some meaningful way, towns will almost always oppose these sorts of developments. It's impossible to fight math. I'm sure there's some NIMBY-ism involved, too, but you don't need any to explain what happens with affordable housing (NIMBY-ism does a much better job explaining opposition to commercial development).
But multi-unit housing typically brings in fewer families with kids, so I bet it evens out. It also doesn't take into account the higher level of Chapter 70 aid it would receive from the state with changing demographics. That is why a lot of these exclusive and super low density towns, often have the highest property taxes. But you did hit the nail on the head about the commercial development, which a town like Sherborn isn't really suitable for in its current form. No major roads. No town water or sewer. Not enough rooftops to support it.
The thing about most other states is they have larger county governments to help pay for things like school and road upgrades to accommodate the growth, and spread the costs among a larger area and population. In the short term there is almost no incentive for these stuffy metro-west suburban towns to increase their housing, as almost everything falls on local property taxpayers.
Where do those counties get their money from, though, if not local property tax payers? Office parks and malls? If that’s the case, than I would support some method of channeling a few tax dollars from Natick and Billerica into Sherborn and Carlisle to try to get the latter towns off of their proverbial butts.
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Originally Posted by jayrandom
Any residential development that doesn't bring in at least that amount of money is going to be a net loser for a town.
Suburban growth seems to have been going well for sunbelt cities like Charlotte, Dallas, Austin, Nashville, etc. If it can happen there, why can’t the same happen here? Surely we have the economy to facilitate it. The costs must be similar enough between the regions.
Last edited by Boston Shudra; 04-22-2020 at 01:28 PM..
Pretty sure it has to be defined as "Affordable" and have deed restrictions, etc. So in a theoretical world where someone at 80% could actually afford something here, it wouldn't be counted.
I'm not sure what you mean.
I was responding to someone who was looking for a more detailed definition of what 80% of average income meant. Was it average income for the town or for the state? I believe was the question.
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Originally Posted by Boston Shudra
That’s nice in theory, but it doesn’t seem to be the approach most of these towns actually take. Sherborn hasn’t grown significantly in population since 1970. In fact it lost ~80 people between 2000 and 2010. It’s decline wasn’t due to an economically struggling populace.
Between 1940 and 1980, the town grew by 300% from ~1000 to ~4000. Since then, for the last 40 years, the town’s population has flat-lined. So clearly there was an era when towns like Sherborn were ok with rapid growth. I wonder what changed?
Part of it is surely a change in family size, but that can’t be the full answer, can it? I know people talk about the “baby boom”, but even before WWII it wasn’t strange for a family to have 4 or 5 kids, was it?
And of course a large growth in average family size in 2020 would put just as much strain on a school system as a large influx of housing with no changes in household size.
Some people seem to think there will be a baby boom in 10 months. So, maybe Sherborn's population will swell then. Who knows?
A reduction in Sherborn's population could be a result of the reduction in average family size. Seems plausible.
The thing about Sherborn though is . . . the town doesn't WANT to grow. People don't move to Sherborn for high density living. They move there for the rural/country feel. Do you honestly believe those people and the officials they elect are going to voluntarily make the town significantly more dense? It's going to take a lot more population growth in the Boston area and more sprawl before a place like Sherborn would be forced to become more dense.
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Originally Posted by Boston Shudra
There are similar towns in the south and west that prove Needham could do better. However for the area, it does pretty well. It wouldn’t be among the top 10 towns in eastern MA that I’d single out as targets for my rant.
South and west MA or the USA? I'm not holding Needham up as a model to copy. It's just an example I know well since I live there. I can say that even though the town is above the 40B threshold they've approved other "affordable" housing projects even thought they didn't have to.
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Originally Posted by massnative71
The thing about most other states is they have larger county governments to help pay for things like school and road upgrades to accommodate the growth, and spread the costs among a larger area and population. In the short term there is almost no incentive for these stuffy metro-west suburban towns to increase their housing, as almost everything falls on local property taxpayers.
People want to keep their RE taxes reasonable. They don't want to raise them to a point where the town becomes unaffordable for everyone. Seniors are always a population I hear about when higher RE taxes are brought up. People don't want the higher taxes to force them out of their long term homes.
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Originally Posted by jayrandom
It costs upwards of $10k/year/kid (probably closer to $15k). Any residential development that doesn't bring in at least that amount of money is going to be a net loser for a town. I live in a big house and pay A LOT in taxes and when both of my kids hit the school system, I will not be paying enough to cover what it costs to educate my kids. An apartment complex full of kids is going to be a net burden on a town's budget. Someone with two school-aged kids might not even cover the cost of educating with their rent, much less their property taxes.
Until the school calculus is changed in some meaningful way, towns will almost always oppose these sorts of developments. It's impossible to fight math. I'm sure there's some NIMBY-ism involved, too, but you don't need any to explain what happens with affordable housing (NIMBY-ism does a much better job explaining opposition to commercial development).
Absolutely NIMBY-ism is rampant in the burbs. Couldn't agree with you more about the net loss for adding students to the population that you mention. That's always a point of discussion in Needham. People assume the town is permissive about teardowns because it brings in more RE tax money. At the end of the day, it's a net loss for the town though. Most of the old homes that are demolished are occupied by empty nesters and the new construction that pops up in it's place typically has multiple kids in it. The increase in RE taxes on that lot are well more than offset by the costs of educating those kids.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Boston Shudra
Suburban growth seems to have been going well for sunbelt cities like Charlotte, Dallas, Austin, Nashville, etc. If it can happen there, why can’t the same happen here? Surely we have the economy to facilitate it. The costs must be similar enough between the regions.
Sunbelt is a very different place. Where do you think you're going to get the land for all of these high density developments?
I was responding to someone who was looking for a more detailed definition of what 80% of average income meant. Was it average income for the town or for the state? I believe was the question.
This is correct. I don’t think yesmaybe answered my question.
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Do you honestly believe those people and the officials they elect are going to voluntarily make the town significantly more dense?
I’m not saying they would if left to their own devices. I’m saying that their refusal to do so hurts the rest of the metro area.
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South and west MA or the USA?
The USA.
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Where do you think you're going to get the land for all of these high density developments?
There’s plenty of empty land in Sherborn, Carlisle, and towns like them. A lack of room absolutely isn’t what’s keeping Greater Boston from sunbelt-style growth.
Suburban growth seems to have been going well for sunbelt cities like Charlotte, Dallas, Austin, Nashville, etc. If it can happen there, why can’t the same happen here? Surely we have the economy to facilitate it. The costs must be similar enough between the regions.
Define "going well"? They have certainly been able to grow. I'm not sure if you asked the people who used to live in the country that they'd agree. Go on the Austin board and ask "so, all this growth has been great, right?" and I'd doubt you get universal agreement.
And I never said there isn't the money, there isn't the incentive. The people of Sherborn have an economic disincentive keeping them from growth. Money aside, I suspect the people that choose to live in Sherborn prefer to live in a place like Sherborn. As long as they retain the ability to limit growth, they will.
Define "going well"? They have certainly been able to grow. I'm not sure if you asked the people who used to live in the country that they'd agree. Go on the Austin board and ask "so, all this growth has been great, right?" and I'd doubt you get universal agreement.
Going well: more modern housing stock, less expensive, more equitable, more diverse, less congested, higher domestic migration.
Most of my personal experience comes from driving around the Rock Hill/Fort Mill area just south of Charlotte. Had a friend in college from Tempe, AZ (A fast growing city/suburb of Phoenix. Probably more akin to Woburn than Carlisle.), and she spoke well of it. I’ll start a thread on the Austin forum and hear what people have to say.
Last edited by Boston Shudra; 04-22-2020 at 04:39 PM..
That’s nice in theory, but it doesn’t seem to be the approach most of these towns actually take. Sherborn hasn’t grown significantly in population since 1970. In fact it lost ~80 people between 2000 and 2010. It’s decline wasn’t due to an economically struggling populace.
Between 1940 and 1980, the town grew by 300% from ~1000 to ~4000. Since then, for the last 40 years, the town’s population has flat-lined. So clearly there was an era when towns like Sherborn were ok with rapid growth. I wonder what changed?
Part of it is surely a change in family size, but that can’t be the full answer, can it? I know people talk about the “baby boom”, but even before WWII it wasn’t strange for a family to have 4 or 5 kids, was it?
And of course a large growth in average family size in 2020 would put just as much strain on a school system as a large influx of housing with no changes in household size.
There are similar towns in the south and west that prove Needham could do better. However for the area, it does pretty well. It wouldn’t be among the top 10 towns in eastern MA that I’d single out as targets for my rant.
Finicialization/VIP-ization of America. A shift towards asset protection and Reaganism hurt our sense fo the greater good and community. We put a premium on "premium" and exclusivity. Just look at the movies (VIP concession stand lines) or Six Flags (Flash pass).
Growing racial diversity means that minorities could move in if you built too many units. This is especially keen in Greater Boston.
Return of the cities, many would-be Sherborn buyers are now Cambridge Buyers, which probablly started incrementally in the 1980s.
The rise of environmentalism beginning in the 1970s.
Define "going well"? They have certainly been able to grow. I'm not sure if you asked the people who used to live in the country that they'd agree. Go on the Austin board and ask "so, all this growth has been great, right?" and I'd doubt you get universal agreement.
And I never said there isn't the money, there isn't the incentive. The people of Sherborn have an economic disincentive keeping them from growth. Money aside, I suspect the people that choose to live in Sherborn prefer to live in a place like Sherborn. As long as they retain the ability to limit growth, they will.
all those cities are doing well by pretty much any measure. Many are doing better than Boston.
Where do those counties get their money from, though, if not local property tax payers? Office parks and malls? If that’s the case, than I would support some method of channeling a few tax dollars from Natick and Billerica into Sherborn and Carlisle to try to get the latter towns off of their proverbial butts.
Some states have county sales taxes. If it's property taxes only, counties at least have the economy of scale. It's much easier to sell a new $100 million school to the people of Sherborn if it's split among the 1.6 million people of Middlesex County, than having the 4K residents of Sherborn pay for it all by themselves. You likewise typically save on contracts and construction costs, in the same manner that a large company does over a small mom and pop.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Boston Shudra
Suburban growth seems to have been going well for sunbelt cities like Charlotte, Dallas, Austin, Nashville, etc. If it can happen there, why can’t the same happen here? Surely we have the economy to facilitate it. The costs must be similar enough between the regions.
But it's not necessarily similar enough. Construction costs in MA are EXTREMELY bloated due to Pacheco law and union influence. I know MA pays 3X as much as NH to pave one single mile of road. And that doesn't even take into consider the cost of acquiring land for such projects, which is prohibitive throughout the Boston area.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Boston Shudra
There’s plenty of empty land in Sherborn, Carlisle, and towns like them. A lack of room absolutely isn’t what’s keeping Greater Boston from sunbelt-style growth.
With all said I actually don't think Sherborn is the best candidate for a lot of new development at this time. It's too inaccessible and far out of the way. No highways. No transit. No town water/sewer...There are plenty of underdeveloped areas of Eastern MA that have those things, and would be better suited at the moment before looking towards less ideal towns like Dover and Sherborn.
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