Mayor outlines housing, zoning rewrite, flood mitigation and transit support in State of the City address

Mayor (unnamed) delivered the State of the City address to the Ithaca Common Council, outlining priorities on housing, land-use reform, sustainability, transit and flood mitigation; the meeting date was not specified in the transcript.

The mayor said the city has taken “historic action to increase market supply and stability in the housing economy,” pointing to zoning-permit streamlining, short-term rental regulation to return units to the long-term market, and tenant protections against non-renewals. The address announced that the city has secured state funding to support a comprehensive rewrite of the zoning ordinance and said the rewrite will be paired with a revision of the comprehensive plan to boost housing supply and address rising property taxes. The mayor identified Director Nicholas, Deputy Director Wilson and planning staff as leads on the zoning effort; the transcript did not specify the exact dollar…