State Housing Production Accelerator

Rising housing costs have left millions struggling to afford housing, prompting states to pass ambitious legislation to remove barriers to development and incentivize housing production. However, translating policy into on-the-ground results ultimately hinges on cities and towns working with limited resources to implement reforms and expand the housing supply.

How can state leaders support cities and towns in implementing legislation to produce more housing?

States are uniquely positioned to collectively support local governments implementing reforms and catalyze housing production. The GPL’s State Housing Production Accelerator supports state executives and housing agencies working with cities and towns to address local housing production barriers like slow permitting and proposal review processes, restrictive zoning and land use policies, under-resourced development communities, and a lack of real-time data on production milestones.

Seizing Unique State Opportunities to Drive Housing Production

In interviews with 65 government leaders, practitioners, and researchers, the GPL found that state-level support for local governments is essential to translate state-level legislative and policy reforms into local results. State governments can advance local implementation of housing policy reform by developing five core capabilities:

• Offering direct technical assistance and support
• Disseminating tools and templates to scale and spread impactful practices
• Facilitating peer-to-peer learning and coaching opportunities
• Providing measurement and evaluation frameworks
• Incorporating local insights into future housing policy priorities

Cohort-Based Support and Community of Practice

The Accelerator serves state governments across the country with different regulatory and reform environments. It engages with states via a cohort and a community of practice.

• The Housing Production Cohort supports a select group of states with applied research and technical assistance to make progress on housing production goals, through activities such as establishing sustainable processes for partnering with cities, piloting improvements in local development pipelines and permitting systems, and scaling best practice.
• The Housing Production Community of Practice convenes a national network for state governments, offering regular learning calls, sharing promising practices, and disseminating insights from the GPL and other leading research and technical assistance organizations. The Community of Practice provides state agency staff access to peer-to-peer learning opportunities, action-ready tools and templates, and experts across the field.