(May 14, 2025) The Westchester County housing shortage, as elsewhere throughout the state, continues to grow. According to Governor Kathy Hochul, this year’s $254 billion budget promises to “build a state where housing is more affordable.”
With state investments into initiatives including the Pro-Housing Community Program and Housing Access Voucher Program (HAVP) pilot, as well as low interest loans for mixed income housing developers, Welcome Home Westchester applauds our state leaders for taking positive steps to alleviate the crisis.
While the state has not adopted zoning reform mandates that would make building much-needed housing less cumbersome, the budget offers funding to municipalities and developers that Welcome Home Westchester urges local officials to take advantage of as they consider affordable housing projects in their communities.
Using these resources, each municipality in Westchester can best determine how to meet even a modest 1 percent annual threshold when it comes to adding new affordable housing. If villages, towns, and cities in Westchester are planning ahead and looking to grow their housing stock, ignoring these state-funded incentives to incorporate affordable housing more easily in development proposals is literally leaving money on the table.
The Welcome Home Westchester campaign looks forward to continuing to engage with our state, county, and local lawmakers to encourage each of our communities to build the housing our residents, businesses, and workers desperately need.