Utah unveils new housing dashboard in effort to hit ‘moonshot' goal of building 35,000 starter homes
Gov. Cox announced plans at the to construct 35,000 starter homes within five years. He shared that since that announcement, 5,100 starter homes have been built and sold.
'We know that's not enough. We're on our way, but we desperately need to do more. With Utah's growing population and we need to do more and we need to move faster,' he said.
Part of the solution, he said, is working with individual cities. He admitted that sometimes there are 'bad actors,' or a few cities that aren't approving plans or trying to drive up costs to prevent development, who can make things more difficult. But more so, he focused on how cities are contributing to fix the problem, saying dozens and dozens of them are striving to improve the housing crisis.
How Utah is working toward increasing more affordable housing
'The American dream of home ownership is slowly but surely slipping away from far too many, out of reach of our children and grandchildren. Reversing that trend requires collaboration. It requires courage and action from all levels of government,' he said. 'We are committed to building 35,000 starter homes in the next four years. That's our moonshot, and we are making progress.'
The governor announced there will be resources to help track and meet this goal, such as a statewide housing dashboard between city governments and the state, which will track progress and identify gaps in success.
The summit also looked at reforms being adopted in other states, including parking mandates, legalizing accessory dwelling units and modernizing building codes.
'We're committed to ensuring Utah doesn't fall behind on housing reform. We know there's been news this week of other states that are passing major housing reform packages. We're watching those closely. We're looking at the reform packages that we've passed over the past couple of years, getting those implemented and watching those changes starting to take hold. These are bipartisan and practical reforms, not left or right, just smart. Utah has always been a leader in that area, and we intend to stay,' he said.
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Clearfield City Mayor Mark Shepherd said housing is an issue that needs to be addressed at every level. He added that legislation in recent years, such as H.B. 462 in 2022, known as Utah Housing Affordability Amendments, and (HTRZ), are now seeing success.
'Without this, the market would have supported about 16,000 units, but with that, the HTRZs, we're now expecting 42,000 units. We are in the process. We see it coming. We've got cities doing everything they can to try to make this happen,' he said. 'There are areas where we need cities' help. We need them to delve in more. We need them to stick the shovels in the ground and really make an effort. But the vast majority of our cities in the state are making huge strides in housing.'
Herriman Mayor Lauren Palmer added that housing is a concern to everyone in the community, which is why it's important for local leaders to come together.
'We have kids that are being impacted by the housing crisis right now, by the price of housing, so as we look forward to collaborating with our development partners, with the state, with other leaders around us, we look forward to finding ways to convert those entitled units into units that can be lived in by our children,' he said. 'They can be an asset to this community that can help people stay in this wonderful state and our wonderful communities that we have helped develop.'
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