February 1, 2007

Hinesburg Affordable Housing Committee

Meeting Minutes

Committee Members Present: Rocky Martin, Carl Bohlen, Andrew Burton, Alan Norris, Donna Constantineau, Julie Pierson, Kellie Stoll, Dale Wernhoff, Mike Landers. Absent: Lea Cassidy. Also present: Bruce Wheeler

• The Meeting was called to order by Rocky at 7:08 p.m.
• Guest speaker for this meeting was Chris Snyder, of The Snyder Companies – a well-established Vermont company that builds, on average, about 50 single homes per year and a small number of multi-family; 99% of the homes Snyder builds are owner occupied, which Chris felt important to note as they are in the business of building HOMES, not HOUSES.
• Chris recognizes the struggle of keeping homes affordable and summarized the 7-8 areas that he feels set the price of homes:
• Cost for raw land
• Permitting costs
• Construction
• Management
• Sales & Marketing
• Warranty
• Financing
• Profit
• Of the list above, it is the cost of the raw land, permitting costs and financing costs that have dramatically increased in recent years – the others have stayed relatively constant.
• The cost of permitting, which includes Act 250, engineer permits, state review, local review, legal fees, impact fees, waste water / storm water permits just to name a few, averages Snyder $400,000 - $1,000,000 on most of the projects that they do.
• When asked about Inclusionary Zoning and if that would deter him as a builder from wanting to build in Hinesburg, Chris said that it might, depending on what the bonuses were. But in general, he believes that market drives price and they operate with a cost driven approach. Due to their experience and years in business, they tend to be very efficient (not all builders are) and will set the prices for their homes at just what they need to be in order to make the profit they seek.
• Chris explained that it’s all about risk and the risk that a builder takes when he commits to a project. His company tends to have a very good idea up front, about whether a project is going to pass through the permitting process. But it’s still a huge risk for an unknown profit once they have to start spending money on the permit process.
• Some suggestions he had that would reduce that risk for a developer in Hinesburg would be to get a growth center designation from the State of Vermont, looking at long range plans and possibly an expedited permit process for those that build affordable homes, and looking at town owned land as a place to build affordable housing.
• Other business: Vermont Interfaith Action update – Rocky contacted St. Judes and they are going to discuss AH and how they might become involved at their next committee meeting; Donna spoke with Bill Neil and he is very interested in this topic, Julia from VIA is going to contact him directly. Kellie contacted Lighthouse Baptist Church but has not heard back.