The pursuit of incorporating new affordable housing stock into Naperville will continue in the coming years as the city council and municipal staffers explore a range of potential ideas.
The council had a wide-ranging discussion at its Tuesday, Feb. 17, meeting about affordable housing and potential next steps. No firm decisions were made, though council members did give direction to take a deeper dive into some of the potential tools that are available in the figurative toolbox.
City in compliance with affordable housing act
Affordable housing has been an oft-discussed topic within Naperville. Several overtures have been taken to explore affordable housing enhancement opportunities in the past, including the hiring of consultant SB Friedman in 2019 to analyze the city’s overall residential landscape.
The renewed look into affordable housing arose last month. During the “new business” portion of the meeting agenda, the council directed city staffers to prepare a report on current-day affordable housing discussions.
Allison Laff, deputy director of the city’s Transportation, Engineering and Development (TED) department, delivered the report at the recent council meeting. Laff outlined a number of recent initiatives, as well as various statistical pieces of data — including Naperville’s compliance with state requirements.
“In January 2024, the city received notice from the Illinois Housing Development Authority (IHDA) that Naperville is now in compliance with IHDA’s Affordable Housing Planning and Appeal Act (AHPAA), based on 10.3% of its housing stock being classified as affordable,” Laff noted in her report to the board.
Laff also affirmed the city has been maintaining an affordable housing catalog, which was a council-directed initiative in late 2024.
“This catalog includes a list of development projects approved since 2019 that have voluntarily contributed to attainable or affordable housing efforts,” Laff wrote in the report. “The catalog provides an overview for each development project, as well as other useful information for potential petitioners, including total affordable units, total units per acre, and variances approved.”
Inclusionary zoning ordinance review underway
The potential implementation of an inclusionary zoning ordinance (IZO) into Naperville’s city code was discussed at the recent council meeting. The concept has been discussed in the past, as Laff outlined in her report, though the council in 2021 opted instead to adopt a voluntary method of bringing new affordable housing into Naperville.
At its core, IZOs typically include some type of requirement for developers, stipulating a portion of otherwise market-rate developments are carved out for affordable housing.
Councilman Ian Holzhauer was one of several elected officials who weighed in on IZOs during the recent discussion.
“One of my big concerns, when I look at these types of ordinances around the country, is that in some communities, it’s just too cumbersome to comply with the ordinance, or to build a house that meets the ordinance,” Holzhauer said in speaking to potential unintended consequences.
Holzhauer added, “As we think about an inclusionary zoning ordinance, I would like us to focus in the coming months on approaches that actually shape how new housing in Naperville is built.”
Mayor Scott Wehrli was one of several council members who directed Laff to analyze which neighboring communities have IZOs — and how they are faring.
“If we’re going to consider IZOs, we should be evaluating what those communities have passed, and what the successes and, maybe, the not-so-successful outcomes, of those are, and also look at them from those who collected fee-in-lieu, vs. those who actually produced an affordable outcome,” Wehrli said.
Speaking from his first-hand experiences, Wehrli added, “Some of the communities I’ve studied over the years, and done business in — they have IZOs, but they haven’t produced any affordable housing units. It looks nice, but it’s not really creating the outcome.”
Naperville resident Philip Meno spoke during public comment and implored city decision-makers to have a firmer mechanism in place to foster affordable housing development within the community.
“Naperville needs an affordable housing ordinance now,” said Meno, who is a part of the DuPage Housing Alliance organization. “Affordability is a hot topic nowadays, but the alliance has been emphasizing affordable housing in Naperville for almost two decades.”
Despite progress, ‘The need is still there’
While there have been past overtures to boost affordable housing stock within Naperville, there was general consensus on the council dais amid the recent discussion that greater strides are necessary in the road ahead.
“The need is still there,” Councilman Benny White said. “When we look at those great folks that work in our police department and our fire department — a lot of them can’t afford to live here.”
Speaking to the AHPAA’s permissible 10.3% threshold for Naperville, White added, “I don’t want us to get fooled a little bit into thinking that we made it when I think that nothing has really changed, just that the formula changed for us,” noting that the median income for Naperville had changed.
White also suggested a broader look at affordable housing accommodations within Naperville, including multi-generational housing, and taking stock of how many such units are in place within the city.
“We do need to understand that people are coming to Naperville, and that’s their experience — that’s probably one thing they would like to have is multi-generational homes,” White added. “I’d like for us to explore that as we continue down this journey.”
In addition to providing an IZO analysis, Laff was directed to meet individually with council members to get a full sense of each official’s goals and priorities for affordable housing before additional next steps are shared at a future meeting.
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