Metro Planning outlines Unified Housing Strategy, calls for 90,000 new homes and targets 20,000 deeply affordable units

Angie Hubbard, director of the housing division at Metro Planning, summarized the city’s newly released Unified Housing Strategy (UHS) and asked the Planning Commission for input on implementation steps.

Hubbard said the UHS estimates a need for roughly 90,000 new homes over the next 10 years — about 9,000 per year — and emphasized a specific shortfall in deeply affordable units: “We need to add 20,000 of these homes affordable to 60% AMI over the next 10 years with priority for that deeply affordable housing.”

The UHS, Hubbard said, is intended to align Metro and public partners (including the Metropolitan Development and Housing Agency), nonprofits, private developers and philanthropic partners around four broad goals: create new housing, preserve existing affordable units, prevent displacement and improve access to housing services and resources. She emphasized that many actions will require federal, state or local subsidy and that Metro’s legal authority is limited: “we cannot require affordability as a condition of zoning… we cannot implement rent controls… we cannot establish locally any tenant protections beyond what is in state law.”

Hubbard outlined key strategy elements staff expect to pursue or support: grow and diversify public and philanthropic funding for affordable housing (noting the Barnes Fund is leveraged roughly nine to one), pursue voluntary state-authorized incentives for “attainable housing,” expand partnerships with institutional landowners (including faith-based property partnerships under a HUD pro-housing grant), and create tools to preserve long-term affordability such as deed restrictions and community land trusts. She said the strategy includes a new staff role to track expiring deed-restricted properties.

On need and targeting, Hubbard gave examples of income thresholds used in the plan: a household at 60% AMI would be roughly $44,940 for a single person and a little over $64,000 for a family of four (figures used in staff calculations). She also flagged the largest gaps are for households earning at or below 30% AMI and stressed that market solutions alone will not produce homes at those price points.

Hubbard described UHS implementation as iterative and performance-driven. Staff will publish performance metrics and maintain a housing dashboard to track outcomes. She said the UHS documents and the public feedback form are available at nashville.gov/uhs and that staff expect to finalize updates (including new HUD AMI numbers) before the new fiscal year launch on July 1.

Why this matters: the strategy frames how Metro will prioritize limited public dollars and incentives, and it signals programs and potential policy proposals that will come before the Planning Commission and Metro Council for review.

Hubbard: “When I use it, for the UHS and whatever our division does, we’re talking about housing that is restricted to households with incomes at 80% or below of our area median income.”

Implementation next steps noted in the presentation include ongoing community engagement throughout May, a scheduled public feedback period, coordination with the city’s housing-and-infrastructure study, and follow-up presentations to bodies such as the Housing Trust Fund Commission. Hubbard told commissioners the city will publish the UHS implementation plan and performance metrics and intends to adjust priorities over time based on results and changing conditions.

Ending: Planning staff asked commissioners to note that the UHS is not a council-voted ordinance but a strategic framework; commissioners and the public were invited to submit comments through the city website during the May feedback period and attend upcoming virtual and in-person briefings.