The Southampton Town Board on Thursday scheduled a series of public hearings for next week, including on the preliminary 2027 town budget, amending the town's tax levy, changes to the Landmarks and Historic District Board, a Jackson Avenue Civic Master Plan, a Riverside Hamlet design pattern book, and acquisition of a Noyac property through the Community Preservation Fund.
Board members spent much of the meeting discussing whether to bring PlaceMate's 'Lease to Locals' and 'Rooted Renters' programs to Southampton, incentive programs that pay landlords to convert seasonal rentals into year-round workforce housing. A presenter from PlaceMate told the board that across all of the company's programs nationwide, it has unlocked 970 new units and housed more than 2,000 people since the first program launched in 2020, and said incentives in Nantucket's version of the program can total up to $27,000 per property.
One council member called the approach "a really great imaginative way of utilizing some of the existing housing stock" but asked whether second-home owners who have never rented their properties would qualify. Another council member compared the subsidy to "choosing who gets vouchers" and questioned letting homeowners pick which tenant's rent gets subsidized.
One council member argued the program would put the town "on a much more predictable and stable path of actually housing people that need it, the workforce," compared with having no such guarantee now. But another council member said he worried landlords would raise rents to market rate once a one-year subsidy ended, saying, "my rent's going up to market rate," said he wanted internal data on seasonal rentals before moving forward, and said the public "would have an issue with subsidizing rent for people making up to $300,000 a year" under Nantucket's income cap.
No vote was taken on the rental program. A board member asked staff to get written feedback from the Town of Nantucket on how its version of the program has worked before the town moves forward.
The board also co-sponsored resolutions to purchase firearms, ammunition and less-lethal products from several vendors under state contracts, introduced a notice to proposers for a new Town Justice Court building with bids due Dec. 17, read a resolution to authorize the sale of one town-owned Pine Barrens development-rights credit to an attorney representing Heritage Square Office Condominiums, and co-sponsored spending Community Housing Fund money to acquire and rehabilitate a Hampton Bays property to create 10 permanently affordable rental apartments.
The board also noted that the town's first-time homebuyer down-payment assistance loan program, recently increased to 18% of purchase price, is already drawing several applications.
The board also introduced a notice of hearing on improvements to the Hampton Bays water district, including a new storage tank. Members closed the meeting with updates on a Redwood Marina ribbon cutting in Sag Harbor, a youth leadership summit on mental health, a resource fair for people with special needs, Veterans Day events, a Sustainability Committee report and a hazardous waste collection event, before voting to move into executive session.