Everyone wants more affordable housing for residents, but little has been done about it. Maui Tomorrow decided to change all that. Our Affordable Housing Committee spent months researching affordable housing plans around the US and has now crafted a plan for Maui County.
Under current economic conditions, the average working class family on Maui has little or no realistic chance of owning their own home. With the passage of the Workforce Housing Ordinance, this could change – provided the County Council continues to support it.
Lots of luxury vacation houses
not so many affordable homes |
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Maui Tomorrow worked hard to get the Workforce Housing Ordinance passed that requires luxury vacation subdivisions to have 50% affordable resident’s housing.
But even though Maui’s requirement is less than Aspen’s 70% requirement, this ordinance is under attack by big developers.
With the economic slowdown, developers are taking advantage of people’s needs for jobs to gut the laws that protect us. Although these developers promise jobs, what they are really doing is setting it up so when the economy upswings, they’ll have won concessions in zoning and affordable housing requirements.
Meanwhile, it’s extremely unlikely that these concessions the County Council has given developers will result in any jobs now, when we need them.
