Transcript
Mayor-President Boulet has framed housing as a top priority for her administration. Six months into her term, we thought we’d check in on her progress.
Hey, it’s Elliot Wade, your Community Reporter here at The Current.
During the 2023 election coverage, you told us that housing was one of your biggest concerns. MP Boulet agreed. So, what’s new? And what can our local government even do about housing?
Local government has basically three ways to impact housing: policy, infrastructure and funding.
Zoning is the most direct policy lever LCG has. The development code influences how easy it is to build new subdivisions or add housing to existing neighborhoods.
As a candidate, Boulet said Lafayette needs to reassess its code, but in a way that still preserves the “unique character of our city.”
That caveat has already influenced decisions for the administration, like last month when Boulet vetoed an ordinance allowing a gas station on University Ave.
Six months in, we’ve not seen any proposals to reform Lafayette’s zoning codes and make it easier to build more housing. But the Boulet administration says it’s currently working on amendments to the code. How deep that will go is unclear.
Then there’s Infrastructure.
And I don’t mean apartments and houses. But the stuff that makes those buildings possible. New apartments in Lafayette’s urban core have been held up by inadequate sewer infrastructure.
LUS Director Jeff Stewart says LUS is making progress on a new sewer project that could come online by 2026. It should be enough to support 2000 additional residential units in Downtown and surrounding areas.
And finally, Funding. We can use tax dollars to build housing developments, like we did in 2020 with a $1.5 million, no-interest loan to help build the Bottle Art Lofts on University Avenue.
On the campaign trail, Boulet championed that project and said she’d be open to others like it, but she has not committed more public funds than LCG has historically — which isn’t much.
Until next time, I’m Elliot Wade and this is Lafayette.