Plano accepts fair-housing analysis and reviews housing study that shows affordability gap for workforce

The City Council accepted a consultant report analyzing impediments to fair housing choice and heard a separate housing‑market study that found widespread housing cost burden among lower- and middle‑income households and recommended a menu of regulatory and financial strategies.

At a public hearing, RKG Associates presented the city’s Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice. Summer Pan, RKG’s project manager, told council the findings show that “West and North Plano, which tend to have higher housing income, have the best fair housing opportunities” while “East Plano … faces more fair housing challenges,” including lower incomes, housing‑condition issues and limited access to resources.

Pan said complaints filed with HUD between 2019 and 2024 rose in 2024 and were primarily associated with disability, race and national origin. She told the council that non‑white applicants “face limited and less successful access to home ownership, home improvement loans, and refinancing in the private mortgage market,” and that Black and Hispanic neighborhoods in southeast Plano experienced a higher incidence of high‑cost lending.

RKG then summarized a separate housing study that measured supply, demand and “jobs‑housing balance.” Kyle Zolenti, RKG President, said the city faces a regional dynamic in which projected job growth and housing demand outpace production at entry and middle price points. “Housing is…