Manchester Selected for Statewide Infill Housing Pilot Program
Manchester has been selected as one of three communities statewide to participate in the 802 Homes For All infill housing pilot, reflecting sustained local efforts to expand workforce and missing-middle housing. Selection was based on the town’s proactive zoning, existing municipal infrastructure, and the groundwork laid through the Housing Task Force and Selectboard to align planning with housing needs. The pilot will focus on identifying infill opportunities within established neighborhoods, streamlining permitting through pre-approved designs, and reducing barriers for small-scale builders. This work builds on prior housing investments and reinforces a long-term, coordinated approach to ensuring Manchester remains accessible to the people who live and work here.
“This is an example of the ‘all of the above’ strategy that will be needed to create the workforce housing needed to make Manchester an affordable place to live for working families.”
Reposted from Manchester Journal
MANCHESTER — Infill housing may not be the fastest track for solving Vermont’s housing crisis, but it may be one that offers less friction than others.
The term refers to housing construction that takes place in an already established neighborhood, on open lots in between other existing homes, filling in those empty spaces, in contrast to a brand new development of multiple housing units. It’s one that Manchester will be exploring further as part of a new phase in the 802 Homes For All initiative, an effort led by the Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development.
Last month, Manchester was one of three towns across the state selected by the housing department to take part in a pilot project to explore infill housing opportunities. Essex Junction and Hartford are the other two communities. Twenty-two communities had applied to be part of the program.
Manchester was one of those selected because town officials made a convincing case for its efforts to date towards developing more workforce housing, said Jeff Dube, the community planning and project manager with the Department of Housing and Community Development.
“Manchester did a great job speaking passionately about wanting to support Manchester’s residents that are more working class … that have just been priced out of some of the housing that’s been seen in Manchester recently,” he said. “They’re looking to support that smaller scale housing, more affordable housing and workforce housing that will cater to the residents that live and work there.”
One goal of the pilot project will be to streamline the planning, permitting and application review process, where the town government would agree to administratively approve certain home designs to speed up the building phase of home construction, he added. And infill housing with a pre-approved home design process offers one pathway among others to make a dent in the shortage of homes working families can afford, he said.
“What we’re trying to do with the infill is to get communities to see that we have development opportunities within existing neighborhoods that are served by existing infrastructure that wouldn’t necessarily change what they see around them,” he said. “It’s really just more of the same.”
To help with streamlining the development process, the Housing and Community Development Department has also developed a toolkit, known as the 802 Homes catalog, that will put 10 community-tested, locally pre-permitted home designs in the hands of small-scale developers to accelerate the timeline from site selection to move-in day. The idea is to have a set of cost-sensitive, pre-approved designs that are compliant with state codes and standards, but also adaptable to small and irregular lots, according to its website.
The infill pilot project, the start of an anticipated year-long collaboration, will kick-off on Friday, Nov. 14 with an online, virtual conversation between state officials and representatives from the three towns involved in the project. That will be followed by an online infill housing tour on Tuesday, Nov. 18, of possible infill housing sites in Manchester, according to a statement released by the Manchester Housing Task Force.
According to the task force’s statement, working in conjunction with the Bennington County Regional Commission (BCRC), they developed recommendations to revise the town’s planned growth areas to match more closely access to municipal water and sewer systems. That led to the Manchester Select Board adopting a resolution to adopt a Tier 1B designation, which allows the town under Act 181, housing legislation passed in 2024 which offers temporary exemptions from and revised parts of the Act 250 land use statute, to have more control over housing projects in the downtown center and planned growth areas.
The infill housing program is part of a broader, all-in approach, said Jonathan West, the chair of the town’s Housing Task Force, which will be working in partnership with the state’s Dept. of Housing and Community Development.
“One of the reasons we were selected was because we do have more infill housing-positive zoning in place,” he said. “The other part of it was the we do have a considerable amount of infrastructure in the ground for a community of 4,500 people.”
And in the Housing Task Force, the town had a team already in place that was tackling these issues, he added.
Based on a housing needs assessment done last year, the town of Manchester has a need for 200 more housing units to be added to the local inventory by 2030. That grows to about 250 housing units when Manchester Village is included, West said.
But at its current pace, the town is only averaging about 13 housing permits per year according to the assessment study done in 2024, which is not enough to meet the need for 200 or more housing units by 2030, he said.
Meanwhile, there may be some help coming for short term housing for seasonal workers. Stratton Mountain has announced it has purchased four area motels, including the Chalet, Chalet Annex, Econolodge and Rest Motel along Depot Street to provide housing for its ski season workers. They also acquired two others, in Londonderry and Winhall, creating the capacity to house about 350 of those workers. The motels have also seen investments in upgrading them from fresh paint to electrical improvements. All together, between the acquisition and upgrades, the ski resort has spent about $12 million, said Matt Jones, the CEO of Stratton.
And this is housing that would be available to other local businesses who need to bring in out-of-town workers for one short-term project or another in-between the ski seasons, he said.
“Right now, we're just focused on opening up to businesses in town,” Jones said. “We're looking at how do we partner with a business, and then they take care of the administration with their employees.”
This is an example of the “all of the above” strategy that will be needed to create the workforce housing needed to make Manchester an affordable place to live for working families, Jonathan West said.
A new phase on that ongoing effort will start on Nov. 14 with an internal kickoff call to discuss goals and engagement events, said Jeff Dube of the housing and community development department. The follow up meeting on the 18th, which will also be online and which the public can join, will explore more closely where the opportunities are for infill projects and what designs might be suitable for those.
There’s a bit of a “back to the future” quality about the process, said State Senator Seth Bongartz, who helped spearhead Act 181 through the legislature in 2024 and has been interested in the housing challenges since his return to the statehouse.
“The concept has similarities to the Sears prefabricated homes of the early twentieth century,” he said. “They were high-quality, attractive, functional and affordable, in part because they were mass produced. This program, from blueprints, to design and code pre-approval, to bulk buying and partial factory construction reflects the kind of creativity it is going to take to get Vermonters into high-quality, affordable homes. I am really pleased that Manchester is taking a leadership role in making it happen.”
Following the virtual tour on Nov. 18, the next meeting of the Housing Task Force will be Thursday, Nov. 20, at 5:30 at the Manchester Town Hall.
https://www.manchesterjournal.com/local-news/manchester-selected-for-infill-housing-project/article_9fa38685-8697-4340-aac7-a36b07d8d18e.html
As always, I can be reached directly at (802) 768-7900 or at west.j@manchester-vt.gov
