Members of Kenton County Planning and Development Services attended a meeting of the Eastside + Neighborhood Association in Covington on Wednesday, where they held discussion sessions with residents about what they wanted to see in the county’s comprehensive plan update. One topic stood out among all of the discussion groups: affordable housing.
“I just want middle-class people be able to buy a home,” said Eastside resident Scott Banford. “Working people have a right to buy a home to pass on some wealth.”
A study of housing in Northern Kentucky has revealed troubling trends for housing in the region, with the largest need being for “workforce housing” for households earning between $15 and $25 per hour, with monthly housing costs between $500 and $1,500. The region needs about 3,000 more housing units to provide for people within that income range, according to the study. The demand for one- to two-bedroom rentals and owned properties consistently exceeds their supply, while supply for three and four-bedroom properties consistently exceeds demand. The study suggests that the region needs to build 6,650 housing units to support economic development in the next five years, which equates to 1,330 units per year. Read more here.
Understanding NKY’s housing shortage
The county comprehensive plan is required to be updated every five years. It serves as a set of recommendations for zoning and development throughout the county. Although many cities have their own zoning regulations, the comprehensive plan serves as sort of a template for cities to follow to ensure development cohesion between the county’s many jurisdictions. Public service agencies and organizations also use comprehensive plans when setting policies.
Andy Videkovich, Kenton County Planning and Development Services’ planning manager, who led the session, spoke about how important the plan was for different jurisdictions and service agencies to plan for the future.
“We’ve got TANK that does the public transit, we’ve got [BE NKY] that does economic development. All of the cities have their own parks departments and stuff, and so the comprehensive plan is really intended to bring that all together under one roof, if you will, and put it all together,” Videkovich said.
Members of the public also weigh in on the comprehensive plan, and if the comments at the meeting in Eastside are any indication, NKY’s ongoing housing shortage is on a lot of people’s minds. And it was getting worse, many felt.
“What I feel now in our neighborhood is that they’re trying to get rid of all the poor people,” said Eastside resident Mary Rice. “They’re trying to buy up all of our housing.”
Rice and other residents talked about investors coming into neighborhoods and knocking on people’s doors, offering to buy up their homes. Some at the meeting viewed this as a de facto attempt to push out the established residents.
“We are being attacked so heavily by home buyers, by people that want to buy up our properties, and it’s like they’re trying to get rid of us,” Rice added.
Rice discussed a large multi-bedroom house in her neighborhood that was flipped for $315,000, she estimated, but only has one occupant. Many of the properties on her street, she said, were unoccupied, creating a grim contrast between the newly flipped house and the empty properties.
“Two guys came to my house Sunday,” said Monique Taylor, another Eastside resident.
Taylor couldn’t remember the men’s names, but she said they were approaching multiple residents wanting to know how much they would pay to sell their homes.
“They came and approached me and asked me what was I willing to sell for,” Taylor said. “I said, ‘Get off my property.'”
Several residents believed that tiny homes, modular homes or multi-family dwellings that working-class families could afford would be better suited for the neighborhood than large, rehabbed single-family homes.
Rice, who is Black, also believed these efforts had an unambiguous racial valence, given that many of the residents were African-American.
“To be honest, I feel like they’re pushing the Blacks out of their neighborhood,” Rice said.
Many of the statements reflected demonstrated trends for housing in the region. In September 2023, the Northern Kentucky Area Development District released a study of housing in Boone, Kenton, Campbell, Gallatin, Carroll, Owen, Grant and Pendleton counties that revealed some troubling trends for housing in the region.
Conducted in partnership with the county fiscal courts, the engineering firm Stantec, as well as local businesses and civic organizations, the study suggested that the above counties needed “to build 6,650 housing units to support economic development in the next 5 years, which equates to 1,330 units per year.”
Broken down by income level, the study showed that largest need is for what they called “workforce housing,” which refers to households whose wages ranged from $15 to $25 hourly with monthly housing costs between $500 and $1,500. The region needs about 3,000 more housing units to provide for people within that income range.
Meanwhile, the overall number of housing units has been trending upward over the past ten years or so in Kenton County. In 2022, the county’s estimated total number of housing units was about 73,000, about 6,500 of which were vacant, according to data analysis from the American Community Survey, a U.S. Census Bureau initiative.
Others felt that there were generally fewer opportunities for working and middle-class families generally.
"Rich people, they can buy whatever they need, and there are programs for the very poor people," Bandford said. "The folks in the middle tend to get left out."
Other topics of discussion were a lack of recreational activities for kids, public transit, parking and transparency of public institutions.
Kenton County Planning and Development Services will host open houses in May where Kenton County residents can learn about the comprehensive plan and give feedback. They are free and open to the public. Dates, times and locations are listed below.
- Tuesday, May 7 from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Kenton County Government Center on Simon Kenton Way in Covington
- Wednesday, May 8 from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Erlanger City Building on Commonwealth Avenue in Erlanger
- Thursday, May 9 from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Independence Senior and Community Center on Jack Woods Parkway in Independence