Zoning change and occupancy limits

[olszowka.livejournal.com]

Recently, I received a letter in the mail from Neraj Tuli of Zone Smart Somerville (www.zonesmartsomerville.org).  The letter was urging me to oppose a provision in the proposed zoning changes which would prohibit occupancy of a house or unit by more than four unrelated adults regardless of the size of the house or unit or other mitigating factors.  Does anyone know anything about this?  I believe I am opposed to this provision, but would like to learn more.

Comments

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

It is laid out on page 168 of the proposed zoning ordinance. "no more than four (4) unrelated persons...where tenany is either by ownership or on a month-to-month basis or longer. Uses where tenancy is arranged for time periods shorter than one month are considered Lodging uses" then you have to go to lodging section to read about that.

So yes, if you have 5 or more bedrooms, you can still have only 4 unrelated people as long term tenants. The organizer said in his testimony that he has a 6 bedroom apartment. There is some additional risk with that many people and I'd never want to be the landlord or tenant in that situation, but I don't consider it overcrowding. Also I don't know why the proposed ordinance doesn't prohibit 4 people from occupying a 1 BR.

[kelkyag]

A limit on people per room or unit area would make more sense to me than a flat limit on unrelated people. (I knew one household of ten, many years ago, though they *bought* their house, which was a lot of paperwork but turned out to be a good deal for them.)

How would more than four people who aren't all related to each other be counted under this rule? Say, three married couples, or a parent with two children and three unrelated adult housemates?

[cos]

For three married couples, the largest set of unrelated people you can make is three, so that's under the limit as I understand this kind of rule. You could search for court cases to see if something like this has been challenged and a court ruled on how to interpret it.

[achinhibitor.livejournal.com]

A limit on people per room or unit area would make more sense to me than a flat limit on unrelated people.

There's a lot of status (and hence, housing price) based on the nature of the people living in an area. If there are a lot of communes in an area, house prices will be lower than if the houses are mostly occupied by nuclear families. The worst is if you have a place where a lot of lowish-income, relatively transient, single males live -- and there's been trouble in lots of places when some landlord realizes that the total rent from such a situation can be significantly higher than from a married couple and one and a half kids.

[josephineave.livejournal.com]

The proposed ordinance doesn't, but other rules quoted above show the minimum sq footage required per person.