40R “Smart Growth” Districts

This is a short blog post to talk about a specific type of zoning district that we discussed at the last Planning and Permitting Committee meeting, which is related to building affordable housing in Medford and getting more money for the new high school.

Massachusetts General Law define a special kind of “Smart Growth” district (40R) that incentivizes the building of affordable housing, while 40S offers incentives for state reimbursements for educating school-aged children living in those districts. (The state website has a great explainer, as does the city of Salem.) 40R districts require that 20% of housing built in them are affordable, and the city can get between $10,000 and $600,000 for implementing a 40R district, plus an extra $3000 per new unit made in each district. This is the carrot to M.G.L. 40B’s stick, which allows developers to ignore local zoning regulations if less than 10% of a city’s housing is considered affordable (which Medford has gotten in hot water in recent years for trying to skirt).

A more important financial incentive for us right now is related to the new high school that Medford hopes to build. If Medford implements one of these districts before the schematic design for the new high school is turned in in February 2027 (see here for a timeline released by a member of the Medford School Committee), we might be able to save up to 1.5% of the cost of the new high school via reimbursements from the Massachusetts School Building Authority — which would amount to several million dollars. This option was discussed pretty extensively at the last City Council planning and permitting committee meeting. Anyhow, at this point, the Office of Planning, Development, and Sustainability is looking into the implementation of these districts, which I got excited about ever since I learned about them, since it pretty much equates to the state giving us a lot of money to build affordable housing.