Housing & Neighborhood Policies

Goal: Neighborhoods & Housing
Provide for orderly growth and development of the City, while valuing our neighborhoods and promoting a sense of community.

Neighborhood policies are intended to create residential neighborhoods that provide residents a place to live, work and play. They foster a sense of community and promote housing choices for residents of all backgrounds, ages, and incomes.

Foster the role of neighborhoods to establish

community character, provide services needed on a day-to-day basis, encourage community interaction, and offer amenities.

• Commit to Maintain. Existing and future neighborhoods should be maintained and enhanced through planning, assistance, and supportive regulatory techniques.
• Promote Walking. The size, layout, and design of neighborhoods should make them conducive to walking, with all residences sharing the sidewalk, trails, and street system and area parks.
• Access to Facilities. New community facilities such as schools and parks should be located within or immediately adjacent to residential areas and linked with sidewalks to promote walking.
• Promote Green Elements. Small parks, greenways, preserved and restored natural areas and other outdoor spaces should be elements of existing and future neighborhoods.

Promote housing choices for all ages and life

stages for existing and future population needs.

• Affordable Housing. The City should encourage the creation and expansion of affordable housing opportunities and preservation of existing housing stock.
• Compatible Infill. Promote compatible residential infill in a range of prices and products to accommodate changing family demographics and market. Medium and higher density areas should be designed with a scale and style compatible with existing residential uses.

New neighborhoods should be an integral part of the broader community. A variety of housing types and densities should be available throughout the City for all income levels.

• Contiguous Development. To the extent practical, new neighborhoods should be contiguous to existing residential development, and isolated sub-divisions should be avoided.
• Multi-Family. Encourage and target placement of multi-family developments near nodes and along corridors to create activity areas that add to the community's quality of life.

In existing neighborhoods, a mixture of land use types, housing sizes and lot sizes may be possible if properly mitigated and respectful of neighborhood character. Require careful design wherever land uses are mixed in order to ensure compatibility, accessibility and appropriate transitions between land uses that vary in intensity and scale.

• Mitigate Impacts. Protect the character and livability of established residential neighborhoods by minimizing spill-over impacts from adjacent commercial areas and incremental expansion of business activities into residential areas.
• Provide Transitions. Design infill and redevelopment to avoid negative impacts and ensure compatibility and appropriate transitions between land uses.
• Housing & Property Maintenance. Ensure that housing meets all applicable zoning and building code requirements. Continue to support adopted exterior building maintenance standards ensuring the upkeep of existing neighborhoods.
• Rental Housing. Continue to seek creative solutions to protect and promote the public health of all citizens, and to encourage owners and occupants of rental properties to maintain and improve the quality of rental housing within the community.
• Housing Rehab. Improve and maintain the quality of existing housing stock through public and private sector investment and contribution to housing rehabilitation. Support community organizations and activities that encourage and provide housing rehabilitation and neighborhood improvements.
• Compatible Infill. Encourage infill housing in older residential neighborhoods that is architecturally compatible with surrounding properties.