Members of the city’s Affordable Housing Advisory Board on Thursday emphasized the need for community education on multifamily housing, more affordable housing development incentives and strategies for boosting deeply affordable options in an ongoing study.

Deeply affordable housing is geared toward people who make less than 60% of the area median income.

That’s a value set each year by the federal government. For a household of one in Lawrence, 60% of the AMI would equate to an annual income of $43,500 or less; for a household of four, $62,100 or less.

Development Strategies, the consulting firm creating the 2025 Affordable Housing Study, has conducted community roundtables and opened a citywide survey in the last many months. They presented an early draft of their results to AHAB on Thursday.

According to the firm’s presentation, 76% of people who responded to the survey “reported having had difficulty finding a home they could afford in Lawrence.”

Andy Pfister, principal with the firm, said that number was high compared to other communities they’ve worked in. 

Mark Buhler, AHAB member, asked Pfister how Lawrence’s housing picture measures up to other communities.

“What we’ve observed in Lawrence is at least a little bit more challenged, more of a tight market, more people are struggling to find suitable housing for their needs than other places,” Pfister said. “Although there are communities similar to Lawrence as well, but it’s a little bit elevated in Lawrence.”

Pfister and Jenny Connelly-Bowen, senior planner with Development Strategies, said the final study will focus on increasing the diversity of housing options across price points; making more housing physically accessible for people with disabilities; and improving housing conditions so homes and apartments aren’t in disrepair.

The study will also address how to communicate affordable housing goals to the community, while either leveraging or evolving city programs and policies to meet the need for increased development. For example, community members said they would like to see more local housing financing tools, tax abatement, local workforce incentives and deeply affordable housing, per the firm’s presentation. 

Many AHAB members concurred that dialogue with the community should be a priority, especially to combat NIMBYism — “Not In My Back Yard”-ism — about housing density and apartments being built in long-standing neighborhoods. 

Connelly-Bowen said that NIMBYism came up frequently in the community conversations they had hosted. Pfister said that increased public dialog proved fruitful in other communities with similar challenges.

“Having some information that, like, ‘Hey, we had this multifamily development in this historic neighborhood in a different community. It actually increased the economic vitality of our neighborhood,’” Pfister said. “… The stories, not just like the research that shows that multifamily doesn’t really have an impact on property values … does help.”

Mariel Ferreiro, AHAB board member, said that re-education is slow, generational work, and agreed that the community engagement should happen early in development processes.

The board also contemplated how the city could create development incentives to increase infill development — a more expensive process than most realize, particularly in older neighborhoods, Pfister said — while ensuring that annexed land gets affordable developments.

Board members touched on recent annexation efforts, including the commission’s approval on Tuesday to annex about 65 acres into northwestern Lawrence and rezone them for construction of single-family homes.

“If we’re annexing to build housing that is increasingly unaffordable, then we are missing the point, and that, I think, is the particular pressure pain point that is happening right now,” Ferreiro said.

Board member Monte Soukup spoke to an item on the presentation about preservation. He said that city staff members and folks in town who are invested in historical preservation tend to take a conservative view. 

“We preserve things that maybe don’t need preservation,” Soukup said. “Our current policy has an environs which the state and the federal government have eliminated, and that impacts development negatively. So to me, what preservation would be would be at least aligning with state and federal preservation policy.”

Ferreiro felt that the preliminary study results lacked specific strategies to ensure deeply affordable housing. She said deeply affordable housing played into homelessness, which is a housing concern that the city has committed to addressing in the “A Place for Everyone” plan.

“Which is really where we’re seeing a lot of difficulty in home ownership, and that intersects with a lot of our conversation around the diversity of our community, those statistics around people of color and their ability to rent or even afford,” she said.

According to Pfister, 11% of Lawrence residents report a disability. Black people, Native people and folks ages 65 and older have elevated rates of disability, suggesting they’re disproportionately affected by lack of accessible housing.

In past discussions about the study, the board noted statistics from the Douglas County’s Homelessness Needs Assessment study showing that that Black people and Native people were overrepresented among those experiencing homelessness, compared to the percentage of Black and Native people in the general population.

Board members considered that they might shift the focus of the Affordable Housing Trust Fund to prioritize fewer units that are more deeply affordable, rather than getting as many units on the ground as possible.

The consultants included people with firsthand experience of homelessness in the community discussion groups, and board members Donnovan Dillon and Faith Lopez emphasized that they should continue to reach out to folks who are directly impacted. Ferreiro also wanted to see suggestions for netting more county buy-in.

Affordable Housing Administrator Lea Roselyn said the city will use the finalized study to inform the next decade of housing policy. The final product, which consultants will present to the city commission in June, will include a mix of recommendations to continue or bolster current goals and policies, as well as suggestions for new growth.

Wulfe Wulfemeyer (they/them), reporter and news editor, has worked with The Lawrence Times since May 2025. They can be reached at wulfe@lawrencekstimes.com.

Read their complete bio here. Read their work for the Times here.

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