A Discussion on the Scarcity of Affordable Housing in GB

'It's Not That Simple' with co-hosts Ed Abrahams (Great Barrington Select Board member) and Pedro Pachano (Great Barrington Planning Board member) airs two Fridays per month at 9:05 am on WSBS.

Ed and Pedro examine issues facing Great Barrington and explore the question, “why don’t they just fix it?” They discuss the complexities, the competing interests, the less obvious costs or consequences, and the missing information that explains why It’s Not That Simple in Great Barrington. They do their best to steer clear of opinion and to just point out the issues that make the problems more complex than they might appear.

Although both men serve on elected town boards in Great Barrington, they are not speaking for those boards or for the town in any capacity. They are only representing themselves on the radio. The program airs every other Friday morning at 9:05 on WSBS. The talk show covers Great Barrington town issues that one may think may be corrected by a common-sense solution but isn't always the case for a variety of reasons.

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April 8, 2022 Episode Topic and Questions at Hand

If housing is in such demand, if housing of all types is scarce, if housing is a basic human right, why do we make it so hard for developers to build it and often vilify them in the process? Everyone agrees that we need more housing. Some ‘affordable’ housing will be built by nonprofits with tax dollars, but the vast majority will be built by people who won’t do it if they can’t make money.

The current system prevents small, incremental developments from happening. The process to get a building project approved is complex, time-consuming, expensive, and uncertain, with many complicated levels of approval. The result is a scarcity of new housing and if time is money, and it definitely is if financing is involved, it increases the cost of housing.

These are the opinions of local developer and property manager, Sam Nickerson of Ecos Properties. Sam is the featured guest on the April 8 edition of 'It's Not That Simple.' During the program, Sam talks about the hurdles faced by developers.

You can listen to the April 8 program of 'It's Not That Simple' below (the audio has been divided into two segments).

Article Image: (from left to right) Pedro Pachano, Sam Nickerson, Ed Abrahams

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