NASHUA – For Sara Alvarado and her mother, Martha, finding a decent place to live that doesn’t come with sky-high rent well out of their price range has so far been an exercise in futility.

“We’ve been looking … everything is too high,” Sara Alvarado said Wednesday night at a forum called “a conversation on affordable housing,” part of a series of public events hosted by the Nashua Area Clergy Housing Justice group and Granite State Organizing Project.

“Downtown, everything is priced out … at Clocktower, it’s $1,575 per month. That’s way too expensive,” Alvarado added, referring to Clocktower Place, the twin, multi-story apartment buildings in converted mill space.

A panel of city officials took turns describing their particular roles in affordable housing, ranging from Mayor Jim Donchess and Ward 4 Alderman Tom Lopez, to city Public Health Director Bobbie Bagley and Deputy Planning Manager Carter Falk.

A group of roughly 60 people turned out for the forum, conducted at the Unitarian-Universalist Church and moderated by Temple Beth Abraham Rabbi Jon Spira-Savett and the host church’s the Rev. Allison Palm.

“We’re begging people to build homes here,” another panelist, Community Development Director Sarah Marchant.

It makes sense for builders of affordable housing to choose Nashua for their projects, with infrastructure, such as water, sewer and other utilities already in place, Marchant added.

Nashua has been struggling with affordable housing numbers for years, she said.

“Just before the economy tanked (in 2008), we were building 200 affordable housing units a year. That dropped to 20, and we’re still not close to where we were,” Marchant said, adding that roughly 50 units are being built each year.

While many Greater Nashuans, if asked, would likely support the concept of affordable housing, that stance often changes when proposals go before planning or zoning officials.

“Part of the problem of how we got here,” Marchant said, is when “a lot of people pack the room” at planning or zoning meetings and speak out against proposed affordable housing projects.

“It’s ‘OK, build it … but please, not near me.’ It makes it very hard when you have 50 people get up and speak against” a proposed project.

“We need people to show up (at the meetings) and say, ‘yes to affordable housing,'” Marchant added.

Falk, with 20 years in the city’s planning department, agreed.

“You’ll hear all about the problems … more traffic, crowded schools, more noise, (decline in) property values … that makes it a lot tougher” for builders to get approval.

Sara Alvarado, meanwhile, suggested the lack of a so-called rental price ceiling is at least partly to blame for the lack of affordable housing.

“The target for new (affordable) units should be the people who are already here,” she said.

And it would be encouraging to see people speaking in favor of affordable housing proposals rather than automatically opposing each one that comes along, she added.

“As children, we’re taught to think of others,” Alvarado added. “It’s too bad the adults here are the ones being selfish.”

Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256, or at dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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