A story in the DesNews Monday, Utahns agree housing is a problem. What they don’t agree on is why, new survey finds, was quite interesting in light of how we (and everyone else around the nation) is trying to deal with the housing affordability issue.  The story says,

More than two-thirds of Utahns believe the state is dealing with serious or even crisis-level housing issues, according to a new survey from Envision Utah.

But they’re not so sure why.

“They’re kind of all over the map,” said Ari Bruening, Envision Utah’s president and CEO. “No. 1, there’s just a lot of confusion. Why is (housing) so expensive? People just don’t really know and they point to a wide variety of causes.”

More than half of respondents assigned high levels of blame to rising interest rates (67%), construction costs (58%), developer or landlord greed (57%), or too many people moving to Utah (53%).

But only 35% did the same for what’s seen as a root cause for Utah’s housing crisis, simply not having enough housing available.

Not only does the public seem to get it that there are a lot of factors that affect housing affordability, but they also don’t seem to put a lot of blame on local land use regulation.  Now, that may be because they don’t want the zoning to change because they might get more housing.

I wanted to see from the survey info itself if that was indeed the case, but the news story provided no link to the actual survey data.  So I called up Envision Utah’s Vice President of Planning Ryan Beck ( a friend and colleague), and he graciously sent me the survey data.

The survey, conducted last September by Heart+Mind Strategies of Reston, Virginia, showed some interesting things.

Just a slight majority of those surveyed (53%) said that they think the way to solve the housing crisis is to build more housing.

When asked what aspect of the housing crisis they believe is in most need of addressing, the news story summarized it this way:

The biggest surprise in the survey for Bruening was the ranking ensuring low-income Utahns can afford to live in neighborhoods with good schools and economic opportunity as the most important housing goal for Utah.

That was chosen as one of the top three housing goals by 49% of survey respondents, followed by providing affordable homes to the very poor and homeless, then to seniors, those with disabilities and veterans.

While people on a general level appear to support additional housing, particularly for lower income people and families, I have always warned that that may be true on a general or statewide level, but when it comes to where to put that housing, support for allowing it in one’s neighborhood falls off dramatically.  In a recent blog post, I cited a study that showed this very phenomenon.

In a piece just this week by Charles Mahron, Strong Town’s founder and President, he said,

In most cities, the expectation is that neighborhoods should remain the same forever. If there’s a fight over growth, it’s usually about where the change should happen (anywhere except near me).

I found the cross-indexing of the survey data by Hearts+Minds most interesting, as it pointed this out:

20% NIMBY Housing Supporters: These Utahns support more/new housing, but not in “my neighborhood

13% NIMBY Housing Opponents: These Utahns don’t support more/new housing in the state, even more so, not in “my neighborhood”.

11% NIMBY Tweeners: These Utahns neither support/oppose more/new homes in Utah, but if they come they do not want them in “my neighborhood”.

8% Full Tweeners: Neither support/oppose more/new homes in Utah and are indifferent where they are built.

15% Non-NIMBY Housing Opponents: These Utahns do not hold NIMBY attitudes, but nevertheless do not support more/new housing in Utah

That only leaves about 33% that would support additional housing built in their own neighborhoods.

Local planning commissioners and elected officials hear from these people at every meeting where new development is proposed in their communities.  State-level officials less so, but that may be changing.  Regardless, this whole tempest in a teapot may be only a small portion of the way to deal with the housing affordability crisis.