Everyone agrees that affordable housing is critical – for seniors who want to live independently in their communities, for young people who want to return or stay in Maine, and for new families looking to plant their roots.

Saco held a conference on this very topic back in June. I said then, and I’d like to explain here, why I believe that policies to incentivize affordable housing must start at the local level.

The role of affordable housing in keeping our towns and cities vibrant and our economy humming is clear. But if we’re really going to commit to affordable housing in practice, not just in theory, then we need to be willing to do what must be done to make it happen.

I know that Saco and other communities in our region are committed to this goal. But too often, we get in our own way. We all say we want developers and private property owners to help us ensure that working families can afford to live in our state. But far too often, we put up hurdles and roadblocks that create disincentives.

Our local elected leaders need to reconsider the way they treat private property owners and developers. They need to re-evaluate expensive fees, building requirements and expectations they put on people who want to help our cities thrive.

Consider subdivision: It doesn’t take an expert to know that a smaller plot of land is less expensive than a large one. Allowing a property owner to turn one large parcel of land into several smaller ones is one of the simplest, most clearcut ways to make property more affordable.

In many communities, the rules about subdivisions in some towns are more than 100 pages long. People who want to help create affordable homes have to go through a months-long or even year-long process involving thousands and thousands of dollars in fees and review costs, and work through a public hearing process that often amounts to little more than neighbors complaining because they don’t like the idea of more people moving onto their street.

In one recent example, a developer was told they would need to invest their own money not only to provide water and sewage access to their own properties, but to ensure that future developers could also hook up to that system. Out of fairness, they requested a percentage of future hookup fees for new users who connected to the system they paid for. The answer was no.

Local government has an interest in overseeing development. We need to ensure it doesn’t damage our environment or put intolerable strain on our public infrastructure. Needless to say, we cannot give property owners carte blanche to do whatever they please.

But I fear that in our zeal to protect the public interest, we come dangerously close to trampling on property rights. Our default position on a private property owner improving their property – whether it’s to add a porch to their home or to subdivide their lot to accommodate affordable housing – should be “yes,” unless there’s a compelling reason not to allow it. But I know that many property owners feel that our default position is too often “no.”

Government cannot create affordable housing by itself. If we really want to make our communities more available to low- and middle-income families (which we all claim we do), then we need to get out of the way of private property owners who could do just that.

— Sen. Linda Valentino of Saco, represents Senate District 31.