Portsmouth Housing Action Plan Explorer

🚨 The Problem

Home prices among highest in NH
Rental vacancies near zero
Workforce displacement accelerating
Families, seniors, young adults squeezed out

✓ What's Missing

No city-adopted Housing Action Plan
No coordinated strategy across departments
No clear accountability or timelines
Response not matching urgency

$500K

Portsmouth already has a Housing Trust to fund this plan

Why This Matters Now

Portsmouth is revising its Master Plan right now. Without a Housing Action Plan, the city risks basing the next decade of policy on narrow assumptions that don't reflect actual market demand—and will fail to deliver voters' #1 goal of making Portsmouth affordable to a wide range of incomes.

This is not experimental. Peer cities like Keene, NH and South Portland, ME are already doing it.

5 Core Components of a Housing Action Plan

Start with Affordability Goals ▼

Begin with voters' #1 goal of a housing market that is affordable to unmet demand from a wide range of incomes, then work backwards to determine the supply targets needed to reach that goal.

Ground in Real Demand Data ▼

Base targets on existing unmet demand, not just population projections. Know exactly how many units at what prices are needed for teachers, nurses, service workers, families, and seniors.

Align All City Tools ▼

Coordinate zoning, building codes, permitting, preservation, and financing tools so they work together—not at cross purposes. Enable private and public investments at the scale needed.

Assign Clear Responsibility ▼

Every task must specify: Who does it? By when? With what resources? Assign responsibility to specific departments, boards, and partners with measurable outcomes.

Stay Flexible ▼

Incorporate the plan into the Master Plan by reference but keep it updatable. The plan should evolve as conditions and data change—more frequently than the Master Plan itself.

How 3 Peer Cities Are Responding

The Baseline

Keene, NH

Framework Without Implementation

✓ Adopted housing strategy with task matrix
◐ Shows responsibilities but lacks detailed steps
✗ No clear timelines or sequencing

View Keene's Plan →

Under Pressure

South Portland, ME

Strong Policy, Weak Implementation

✓ Blunt assessment: incrementalism will fail
✓ Recommendations matrix ranking interventions
✗ Doesn't assign tasks or provide timeline

View South Portland's Plan →

The Model

Burien, WA

Policy + Process = Implementation

✓ Each recommendation paired with specific tasks
✓ Lead departments, timelines, and partners named
✓ Metrics to track progress

View Burien's Plan →

The Pattern Is Clear

Across very different geographies and political cultures, these cities reached the same conclusion:

"Housing problems do not solve themselves through incrementalism, and they do not respond well to fragmented governance."

Portsmouth now stands out not because it lacks data, but because it lacks the tool its peers already use to act on that data.

Common Questions — Answered

Wouldn't an incremental approach be better?

In stable markets, yes. In Portsmouth's severely constrained market, no.

Piecemeal efforts produce fragmented wins, reactive policy, and missed opportunities. A Housing Action Plan doesn't eliminate opportunism—it channels opportunism strategically, aligning it with long-term goals.

The City can't make anyone build anything.

True—and irrelevant.

Cities can't force construction, but they control whether housing is legal, feasible, and predictable to build. A Housing Action Plan removes self-imposed barriers to affordable housing options and aligns incentives so needed housing can actually be built.

Government moves at a snail's pace.

Slow government is a choice, not a law of nature.

Delays occur when responsibility is diffuse, decisions reset with elections, and no one owns implementation. A Housing Action Plan assigns clear ownership, priorities, and timelines, enabling staff to act decisively.

Who would create it—and how would we pay for it?

Portsmouth already has the resources.

The city has a Housing Trust of roughly $500,000 designated for housing initiatives. Using a portion to develop an action plan isn't extravagance—it's responsible governance. Many cities designate a housing manager to coordinate implementation and often pay for the position by unlocking external funding.

A to-do list is enough; we don't need more bureaucracy.

A real Housing Action Plan is not a simple list of ideas.

It's a living document that pairs each goal with concrete actions and assigns accountability. Burien's plan shows what this looks like: each recommendation (e.g., "Retain affordable market-rate units") is paired with specific tasks—collecting data, expanding landlord reporting, working with housing providers—plus lead departments and timelines.

Portsmouth Needs a Housing Action Plan