Region-wide future land use map presented as borough and planning commission weigh housing shortfall and zoning timeline

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Regional planning staff from the Center Region Council of Governments on June 3 presented a draft comprehensive plan and future land use map to a joint meeting of the State College Borough Council and the Planning Commission, highlighting a regionwide housing-capacity analysis and laying out a process and schedule for a separate borough zoning rewrite.

Pam Adams, CRCOG regional planning director, framed the comprehensive plan as a long-range policy authorized by the Pennsylvania Municipal Planning Code intended to establish a shared vision for where and how the Center Region — including State College Borough and surrounding townships — should grow. "It is a long range policy looking into the future as far as our vision for where and how we want this community to grow," Adams said.

The presentation included REDCap (regional development capacity) figures: CRCOG staff reported about 3,300 acres available inside the regional growth boundary and approximately 10,000 residential units of capacity regionwide, of which about 7,000 are tied to approved plans and roughly 3,700 sit on vacant land without active plans. Staff also noted about 973 housing units permitted since the 2023 REDCap report, including a 700-unit Greystar Hastings project downtown.

Jenna Wargo, a CRCOG presenter, emphasized that the map's residential classifications were density-driven. "So pretty much the biggest theme for all of the residential land use classifications, it's a math problem," Wargo said, describing the methodology used to translate density assumptions into capacity estimates.

For the State College Borough specifically, staff said the borough is expected to see an increase of about 2,900 residents over the next 20 years, which, using the borough household size of 2.17, translates to roughly 1,300 housing units needed. Staff said permitted units reduce but do not eliminate that need.

Commissioners and attendees probed the underlying data. A planning participant concerned about the 2020 census said the borough and Patton Township were likely undercounted, and a staff member estimated the undercount could be "several thousand residents, maybe as many as 3,000 to 5,000." Commissioners asked whether approved and permitted units are primarily student housing or long-term housing for workforce and owner-occupants; presenters said much of recent permitting in the borough has been higher-density student-oriented projects and that the zoning rewrite aims, in part, to incentivize more homeownership and workforce housing.

Panelists discussed the primary regional tools to manage growth: the regional growth boundary combined with the sewer service area (Act 537 sewer planning) was described as the principal regulatory "teeth;" other options cited included transfer of development rights, coordination with the MPO for transportation planning, and soft tools such as inter-municipal persuasion and education.

A series of public comments emphasized local priorities. Catherine Santoro, a borough resident, urged planners to consider accessible housing for older residents and to locate such housing near transit. Carl Aronson, another resident, said the 2026 draft appeared to have removed an explicit bicycling-transportation mechanism that existed in the 2013 map and asked for clearer treatment of bicycle infrastructure in land-use planning. Other commenters suggested consolidation of municipal services and questioned methodological assumptions behind unit-need calculations.

Borough staff reviewed a proposed timeline to align the zoning rewrite with statutory review periods: staff described two required 45-day reviews with regional and county planning agencies, neighborhood meetings planned over the summer, reintroduction of a third draft in September, a likely public hearing in early November and potential adoption in December — noting the schedule was illustrative to show how an end-of-year adoption could be achieved and not a staff recommendation to accelerate review.

The meeting recessed for an activity and later moved into a short public-comment period before adjourning.

What happens next: CRCOG and municipal staff will incorporate feedback from the meeting and ongoing public engagement into the draft comprehensive plan and REDCap updates; the borough's zoning rewrite will follow the statutory review process described by staff and is subject to schedule changes and further public input.