NORTHAMPTON — City officials, housing advocates, and business owners are expected to discuss the current state of housing in Northampton at a Tuesday night meeting in City Council chambers.
The meeting is a launch of the Municipal Engagement Initiative, or MEI, run by Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association (CHAPA), a Boston organization that advocates for greater affordable housing across Massachusetts and has been behind many of the prior legislation in the state on housing issues.
According to CHAPA’s website, the purpose of a Municipal Engagement Initiative is to work “with residents on the ground to change the conversation and support existing local efforts in favor of more affordable housing.”
Keith Benoit, a community development planner for the city of Northampton, said he applied for the MEI for Northampton. Although the MEI is generally a yearlong collaboration between CHAPA, the city and interested stakeholder groups, Northampton opted for the MEI’s “Lite” option, which simply helps with community outreach and helps build a coalition of housing advocates, Benoit said.
“We just wanted to bring together people to talk about housing, and there might be some themes that come up,” Benoit said. “But really, we want to elevate the conversation about housing, to get people thinking about the needs of the city.”
According to the agenda posted by the Northampton Housing Partnership, the meeting, which begins at 6 p.m. and is expected to run for two hours, will introduce the MEI and the purpose behind it, as well as sharing data about the current state of housing in Northampton and some of the barriers that building new housing faces in the city.
Several housing developments in recent years have faced opposition from city residents. Planned redevelopment bringing new housing in the Bay State Village area of the city, as well as a planned condo development at 107 Williams St., have faced opposition from nearby residents.
Benoit said the meeting would not seek to address issues about any specific housing project in the city, but instead be focused more on the city’s current status and attitudes toward housing and look for input from the community on how to draw more support.
“There’s been different projects throughout the city where there might be some resistance about putting in housing,” Benoit said. “At the last quarter of the meeting there will be some public engagement, just trying to get the temperature of the room.”
In addition to being held in person, participants have also been allowed to attend remotely via Zoom, due to the high demand for the event.
Alexander MacDougall can be reached at amacdougall@gazettenet.com.
