In the wake of the latest blow to affordable housing construction on the northwest side—a City Council zoning committee no vote last week on a proposed development with 30 affordable units in the 41st ward—advocates and aldermen have joined forces on a new ordinance package. The proposed new rules would give affordable housing proposals the same due process in City Council that strip clubs currently enjoy.
In an attempt to limit aldermanic prerogative—the City Council custom that affords aldermen wide latitude to veto development proposals in their wards—the ordinances would require aldermen to present hard evidence about any possible negative impacts the development might have on their ward. It wouldn’t be sufficient to simply claim—as 41st Ward alderman Anthony Napolitano did last week—that according to his calculations, there’s already sufficient affordable housing in the area. Arguments about local resident opposition to the project also wouldn’t cut it.
