Chapter 40B has been the affordable housing law in Massachusetts for more than 40 years. Soon, it will—or won’t—be repealed. Either way, Harvard will be in the same place it has been for decades—woefully lacking in housing to meet the needs of a diverse population. Young people growing up in Harvard will continue to be forced to look elsewhere for starter housing, seniors wishing to downsize (to subsidized housing or otherwise) and anyone needing assisted living or nursing care will continue to leave. Most town employees will live elsewhere. Just as it has been in recent memory.

40B has not made housing in Harvard significantly better or worse. What has been lacking is determination by the town to decide what kind of place it wants to be, and to take action to make it happen. To be sure, from time to time there have been initiatives for senior and/or affordable housing. The last time a serious effort was mounted was 2004, when the (now disbanded) Housing Partnership led the formulation of an Affordable Housing Plan, as required by state regulations. Based on a survey of needs, plans were put in place that, if executed, would have led to Harvard meeting the 10 percent affordability target mandated by 40B. As has been the case with all such plans to date, very little actually happened, and Harvard remains with less than 3 percent of its housing stock on the Subsidized Housing Inventory that defines affordability.

Harvard should look to the example set by the town of Lincoln. Currently at 10.9 percent affordable housing, leaders in Lincoln decided years ago that, to be the kind of town it wanted to be, Lincoln needed to support a diverse population. Lincoln didn’t wait for developers to avail themselves of 40B, but rather sought and facilitated projects to create housing to meet defined needs.

The Master Plan must be updated a little more than a year from now. Now is the time to stop paying lip service to housing needs, and make Harvard hospitable for all.