by Jenna Connolly | Nov 21, 2025 | Featured News, Housing News
Over 400 housing leaders from across the Commonwealth, including Governor Maura Healey, Lieutenant Governor Kim Driscoll, and Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities Secretary Ed Augustus, convened yesterday to shape how the Commonwealth can boost our housing production and meet the state’s goal of 222,000 homes by 2035. Hosted by Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association (CHAPA), the Housing Summit featured experts in modular housing, infrastructure, and climate innovation who presented creative solutions to meet the Commonwealth’s housing shortage.
“It was inspiring to join so many thoughtful and committed leaders at the CHAPA Summit who have been strong partners in our efforts to make housing more affordable across Massachusetts,” said Governor Maura Healey. “With CHAPA’s support, we’ve made significant progress — passing the Affordable Homes Act, legalizing ADUs by right, creating an Office of Fair Housing and setting the first ever statewide housing production goal. Thanks to this work, we have nearly 100,000 housing starts already underway and we’re going to continue our partnership to build more housing and lower costs for the people of Massachusetts.”
The Summit opened with a panel led by Secretary Augustus and his colleagues from across sectors: Commissioner Adam Baacke, DCAMM Undersecretary for Environment Stephanie Cooper, Undersecretary of Labor Josh Cutler, and Chief Melissa Hoffer. The panel explored how the Commonwealth can work together as a state to meet Massachusetts’ housing goals. Senator Julian Cyr and Representative Andy Vargas gave opening remarks after the panel.
“The Healey-Driscoll Administration knows that we need to accelerate housing production right now to bring down costs and provide relief to renters and homeowners navigating the tight housing market,” said Ed Augustus, Secretary of Housing and Livable Communities. “As we look to what’s next for housing in Massachusetts, we are grateful to CHAPA and today’s summit for convening the best minds in housing policy to brainstorm new solutions and deliver impact.”
Other topics explored during the event included exploring how strategic land reuse, such as the Yes in God’s Backyard (YIGBY) legislation, can dramatically increase housing capacity across the Commonwealth, using innovative construction methods, such as Mass timber, to build sustainable housing faster, and finally how developers will obtain the capital and train the workforce to build the housing needed in communities across the state. Visit the Housing Summit website for the full event agenda with panel topics and speakers.
Building on the lessons learned from the Summit, CHAPA will lead efforts to turn insights into action, creating tangible outcomes that help thousands of Massachusetts residents gain and maintain stable housing.
Summit attendees also heard from experts from Nectar Community Investments, Reframe Systems, Way Finders, Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC), Massachusetts Housing Partnership (MHP), Devens Enterprise Commission, BLD Properties, Northern Middlesex Council of Governments (NMCOG), Community Economic Development Assistance Corporation (CEDAC), Boston Communities, Mass Cultural Council, The Lynch Foundation, the Office of Real Estate Management Division of Capital Asset Management & Maintenance (DCAMM), Father Bill’s & MainSpring, ISC Massachusetts, Boston Housing Authority, Beacon Communities, Allston Brighton Community Development Corporation, Massachusetts Community Climate Bank, Causeway Development, National Housing Crisis Task Force, CREA, State Street, MassHousing, Massachusetts Housing Investment Corporation (MHIC), ICON Architecture, City of Boston, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, Preservation of Affordable Housing (POAH), Stantec, National Development, Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP), Harvard University, Graduate School of Design, Capstone Communities, WoodWorks – Wood Products Council, Monte French Design Studio, Code Red Consultants, Leggat McCall Properties LLC, NEI General Contracting, MassINC Policy Center, Just A Start, and Massachusetts American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO).
by Jordan Stocker | Nov 13, 2025 | Featured News, Housing News
This week, the Boston Foundation, Boston Indicators, and Boston University released the 2025 Greater Boston Housing Report Card , offering a detailed look at how the region’s housing market is changing and where challenges remain. The report indicates that while Greater Boston is making progress, the region’s housing pressures are still severe. Home prices and rents have leveled off in 2025 but remain near record highs. A household that needed $98,000 to buy a modest home in 2021 now needs more than $160,000, and only a small share of renters can afford to buy. Since 2020, Greater Boston has added more than 70,000 new homes, but new building permits are down 44 percent since 2021, signaling a slowdown in future supply. Homelessness also remains high, and while fewer families are currently in shelters, the report notes that it is not yet clear whether families are finding stable housing, relocating, or moving into other temporary arrangements.
These findings highlight both the scale of the challenge and the importance of continuing to advance the tools now available to communities. The Affordable Homes Act is strengthening Massachusetts’ ability to build and preserve affordable housing, modernize public housing, and support renters through new investments and programs. And across the state, 158 communities have now adopted local zoning that allows more multi-family homes near transit through the MBTA Communities Act, helping neighborhoods grow in ways that improve access to jobs, reduce long commutes, and make it easier for people to stay connected to opportunity.
Reaching the goal of 222,000 new homes by 2035 will take commitment, creativity, and collaboration at every level of government and across every community. By building on what works and following through on our shared goals, Massachusetts can ensure that everyone has a safe, stable home in the community of their choice.
View the full report here.
by Jenna Connolly | Nov 6, 2025 | Featured News, Housing News
Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association (CHAPA) opened applications for its new Massachusetts Housing Leadership Academy, a six-month fellowship designed to empower local officials with the knowledge, skills, and network to create more homes for people of all ages, incomes, and abilities in their communities. With a housing shortage of 222,000 new homes needed by 2035 and local decision-making determining much of the Commonwealth’s development, strengthening the voices of pro-housing municipal leaders will benefit Massachusetts’ communities, people, and economy.
“When we work towards creating more housing in every city and town, teachers, nurses, and firefighters can afford to live near their workplace. People can downsize in the communities they love. College graduates can come home,” said Rachel Heller, CHAPA’s chief executive officer. “The Massachusetts Housing Leadership Academy will prepare local leaders to meet the housing needs of all members of their communities so everyone can thrive.”
CHAPA’s Academy is free and open to: Mayors, City and Town Councilors, Planning and Select Board Members, Finance Committee members, and any members of boards and commissions who can impact housing. The Academy’s curriculum will cover the history and causes of the Commonwealth’s housing shortage, municipal solutions, and strategies for taking those solutions from idea to implementation. Fellows will benefit from monthly virtual workshops with housing experts, monthly cohort meetings, and more.
The Massachusetts Housing Leadership Academy builds upon CHAPA’s proven community engagement model. CHAPA’s Municipal Engagement Initiative, a program supporting local pro-housing coalition-building, has worked in 45 communities since 2018 with groups like Engine 6 in Newton and the Greater Newburyport Housing Choice Coalition. In 2023, CHAPA expanded its reach to offer free technical assistance and community engagement to planners seeking compliance with the MBTA Communities Act. 97% of the 85 communities CHAPA supported have now achieved compliance.
“Proactive, inclusive, and informed community engagement can move the needle on creating more housing opportunities,” said Lily Linke, CHAPA’s director of municipal engagement. “From the Cape to the Berkshires, there are countless elected and appointed local officials who are dedicated to solving their communities’ housing challenges, and the Massachusetts Housing Leadership Academy can provide them with the tools they need to succeed.”
The first fellowship of the Massachusetts Housing Leadership Academy will run from January to June 2026. Those interested in the Academy can apply or nominate an official in their community at bit.ly/MAHousingLeadershipAcademy until December 15, 2025.
by Jacob Love | Oct 9, 2025 | Featured News, Housing News
Last week, ProPublica reported that the Trump Administration is considering two major rule changes to federal housing programs that could deprive countless families of housing assistance and put them at risk of homelessness.
Both changes would have to undergo a public comment period prior to adoption. But, if allowed to take effect, they would: (1) permit public housing authorities and private landlords to implement work requirements and time limits for residence in public housing and receipt of certain federal housing subsidies (i.e., Housing Choice Vouchers and Project-Based Rental Assistance); and (2) largely prohibit federal housing assistance from going to qualified people—including many American citizens—who happen to live in a home with an ineligible non-citizen (a “mixed-status” home).
While these regulatory reforms would be devastating for countless families with low incomes across the country, including many here in the Bay State, there is still time to push back. CHAPA strongly opposes both proposals and urges the federal government to reject them.
As we grapple with a nationwide affordable housing shortage and sky-high housing costs, our leaders should be championing proven solutions to our housing challenges. That’s why CHAPA works tirelessly on evidence-backed initiatives to boost affordable housing production, expand supportive housing programs, and implement inclusionary zoning reform.
Those are the kinds of policies we need to ensure that everyone in Massachusetts has access to a safe, stable, and affordable home. However, much like the policies propounded in the Administration’s recent executive order on homelessness, the justifications for these new rule changes run counter to the evidence and hinge on false premises.
Experts cited by ProPublica estimate that opening the door to work requirements and time limits could lead to a staggering 4 million people losing housing assistance. Although the Administration has claimed that these kinds of program constraints help generate “self-sufficiency,” a mountain of research supports that work requirements and time limits do not boost employment. The reality is that such constraints will strip vulnerable families of desperately needed assistance, exposing them to housing instability and homelessness without advancing the Administration’s purported underlying goal.
Likewise, HUD predicts that the new mixed-status rule will cause nearly every subsidy recipient in 20,000 mixed-status homes to relinquish their housing assistance to avoid family separation. This will subject thousands of children, many of them American citizens, to the numerous harmful effects of housing instability. The Administration contends that this change is needed to “ensure that only eligible persons receive benefits.” But not only do they point to no evidence that benefits are going to ineligible non-citizens, HUD’s current rules prevent that by prorating subsidies for recipients in mixed-status homes. Put simply, this change will operate to kick many thousands of eligible people out of vital HUD programs to fix a non-existent problem.
Fundamentally, in the midst of our affordable housing crisis, the facts tell us that more people need access to rental assistance, not fewer. CHAPA thus implores the Administration to drop these cruel and shortsighted proposals, which will only serve to hurt vulnerable families. Until that happens, we encourage everyone to join us in formally opposing the rules during the public comment period and vehemently advocating against their implementation.
by Matt Noyes | Aug 11, 2025 | Housing News
Last week, Governor Healey signed S2575, the FY2025 Supplemental Budget, into law. Included in this legislation was $1 million in funding directed to the Fair Housing Trust. The Trust, which was created last year as part of the Affordable Homes Act, will be used to advance fair housing across Massachusetts. The resources from the Supplemental Budget represent the initial allocation for the trust.
Huge thanks goes out to Representative Dave Rogers for filing the amendment in the House to fund the Trust. Also thanks to the Senate Ways and Means Committee for including the funding in the bill they reported out and to Governor Healey for signing it into law.
Certainly positive news we can all be proud of!
by Jenna Connolly | Aug 5, 2025 | Housing News
On July 24th, President Trump issued an Executive Order (“EO”) on homelessness that trades effective solutions for fear-based politics. Casting the unhoused as “public safety threats,” the EO sidelines proven Housing First strategies in favor of punitive measures, like homeless sweeps and prosecution, that displace rather than house. This kind of crackdown will only serve to create more barriers to housing, not fewer.
The Massachusetts Supportive Housing Pipeline Coalition (the “Coalition”) believes that everyone in Massachusetts deserves access to a safe and affordable home in the community of their choice. That is especially true for our neighbors experiencing homelessness who have the most to gain from stable, long-term housing. Overwhelming evidence shows that supportive housing is the most effective way to help this population. Supportive housing combines the Housing First strategy—which prioritizes fast, affordable, and permanent housing placement for those experiencing homelessness—with ongoing, person-centered services to increase well-being and improve housing stability.
Rising housing costs across the country continue to make affordable housing out of reach for millions and have contributed to record-high homelessness. To combat these issues, elected officials should be championing evidence-based solutions like supportive housing. Instead, the EO does the opposite and undermines state-level Housing First programs by directing the Executive Branch to “end[] support for ‘housing first’ policies.”
This directive could have disastrous consequences in Massachusetts. Not only is the Commonwealth already grappling with an affordable housing shortage, but recent social safety net cuts and changes to Medicaid and SNAP will soon inflict serious financial harm on the poorest Bay Staters. Under these conditions, any reduction in federal funding for supportive housing will hinder our best homelessness interventions, exacerbating and prolonging housing instability for countless Massachusetts individuals and families.
Contrary to the EO’s messaging, the unhoused are both less likely than housed people to commit violent crime, and more likely to be the victims of violence than to perpetrate it. And while many within the unhoused population struggle with drug use and mental health, research reveals that a third live with a serious mental illness and that 20-35% suffer from substance abuse issues. Far from overwhelming numbers.
False narratives about homeless people incite fear and dehumanization. And yet the EO relies on those narratives to justify its support for harsh and punitive tactics. Among its other directives, the EO instructs federal agencies to:
- Prioritize federal funding for jurisdictions that “enforce prohibitions” on things like “urban camping and loitering;” and
- Maximize involuntary civil commitment as a response to homelessness.
Encampment sweeps and other policies that criminalize survival activities may temporarily remove homeless people from sight, but they negatively impact health outcomes and can exacerbate homelessness in the long term. Involuntary commitments suffer from similar drawbacks. Jurisdictions that have studied forced hospitalization have found that it often fails the first time. And mental health professionals have explained that the practice is liable to cause serious trauma and do more harm than good, while providing no guarantee of housing, treatment, or recovery support services after discharge.
Even more fundamentally, these interventions do nothing to mitigate the primary structural driver of homelessness: a widespread lack of affordable housing.
The Coalition, which represents over 80 diverse organizations working in housing production, healthcare, and homelessness, has built a strong network of Commonwealth leaders and stakeholders committed to advancing the housing solutions we know work. Together, our impactful advocacy has already helped create new tools like the Supportive Housing Pool Fund, as well as three state commissions focused on affordable housing. The Coalition is committed to fostering a Massachusetts where homelessness is rare, brief, and one-time. And it will push back against any policy that impedes that goal, including the EO.
To make progress on homelessness, we must reject fear-based narratives and focus on strategies grounded in data and human dignity. That means restoring federal support for the Housing First approach and ending punitive policies that inflict damage without lasting results. There is still time to reverse the course charted in this EO, and the Coalition implores federal officials to do so immediately. Now is the time to focus on the future we want to see for Massachusetts—one where everyone has the support they need to thrive.
Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association (CHAPA)
Massachusetts Association for Mental Health (MAMH)
Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance (MHSA)
United Way of Massachusetts Bay
Western Massachusetts Network to End Homelessness
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The Massachusetts Supportive Housing Pipeline Coalition is a diverse coalition of more than 80 nonprofit and for-profit developers, healthcare companies, service providers, policy organizations, and advocates working to scale supportive housing options and ensure those with the most to gain from a home have what they need to heal and thrive. To learn more, please visit masupportivehousingcoalition.org.
