Present at the Monday, April 20, Village Council meeting were, from left Councilors Stephanie Pearce, Senay Semere, Carmen Brown, Angie Hsu and Gavin DeVore Leonard. At that meeting, the group reviewed the discussion held at an earlier housing-focused retreat. (Video still)
Village Council’s housing goals come into view
- Published: April 30, 2026
Earlier this year, when Village Council members formalized and approved their two-year legislative and organizational goals, little was said about an oft-touted Village focus: affordable housing.
Given that each of the five sitting Council members have, at various points, identified creating more affordable housing opportunities in Yellow Springs as a top priority, Council members agreed during their goal-setting discussions to set aside the topic for a time when the group could focus solely on the matter.
That time came earlier this month when Council and Village staff members gathered for a six-hour retreat on Thursday, April 9, to drill down on all matters housing-related in the village. Council walked away from that meeting with some wide-ranging goals. Some notable ones:
• Considering amendments to the zoning code to encourage or better facilitate the creation of affordable housing options;
• Getting appraisals for Village-owned land — specifically Glass Farm and the lot at Corry and President streets — to better understand their value and potential as sites for housing, and later, issuing out a request for proposals to housing developers for those properties, as well as soliciting public input;
• Outlining the cost-benefits of continuing to own and lease the 16-unit Lawson Place apartment complex, and generally reviewing the Village’s approach to being a landlord;
• Possibly enacting fees or policies to discourage extended home vacancies;
• Enforcing code standards for all rental units in Yellow Springs, and also placing every rental property on a registry;
• Clarifying the Village’s codified definitions of affordability, housing-related needs and overall priorities; and
• Penning a kind of “mission statement” that formalizes the Village’s approach to creating affordable housing opportunities.
A key document that will inform those goals will be a forthcoming updated Housing Needs Assessment of Yellow Springs by Bowen National Research.
The last Bowen study was published in 2018, and drew from local market conditions and demographic trends in the village to recommend growing the local housing stock considerably — namely affordable and workforce housing.
Assistant Village Manager Elyse Giardullo told the News earlier this week that the Village expects Bowen to finish the updated assessment in the coming weeks.
Another pending document that will guide the Village in future considerations is a pro forma financial analysis that will detail every cost associated with operating the Lawson Place Apartments. At the work session, Village Manager Johnnie Burns said revisiting the topic of Lawson Place was his highest priority.
“Our staff got more work, but we didn’t get more staff to do the work,” Burns said of the Village’s 2021 decision to purchase the apartment complex and function as a landlord.
Like the Bowen study, the Village contracted a third party to author the financial analysis of Lawson Place; Giardullo said she expects this document to be handed over to Village staff soon.
But perhaps the most crucial element in helping Council actualize its housing goals will be the imminent hiring of a new planning and economic development director — a notable vacancy since Meg Leatherman left the Village last fall. Giardullo said she and the administrative staff are in the “final stages” of hiring Leatherman’s successor.
Another Village Council housing-specific meeting is planned for mid-June when the group will not only prioritize their outlined housing goals, but also further consider the possibility of establishing an official Village housing commission.
The News will publish full reports of the updated Bowen housing study and the Lawson Place pro forma when those documents are made available.
In other Village Council business—
Personnel policy updates
At Council’s most recent regular meeting, Monday, April 20, Council members gave first reading to an ordinance that will amend the Village’s personnel policy manual.
“Our goals in doing this review were to clarify the existing policies, align the manual with current practices, improve recruitment and retention — especially in today’s world — and modernize and update the language where needed,” Giardullo told Council members.
Most changes to the personnel policy deal with employee compensation and time off. Examples of the proposed changes include the establishment of a four-week, paid parental leave; the creation of longevity pay; more vacation time up front for new hires; and a guaranteed minimum number of paid hours when working certain events.
Council members generally seemed supportive of the proposed amendments. The group will vote on the ordinance following a public hearing at the next regular Council meeting, Monday, May 5.
$32,000 to Senior Ctr.
By a unanimous vote of 5–0, Village Council approved a resolution that established a one-time grant of $32,000 to the Yellow Springs Senior Center to help them purchase the former lumber yard at 108 Cliff St.
As the News reported earlier this month, the Senior Center plans to rehabilitate the Cliff Street site to meet the needs of the center’s growing membership of more than 800 people. The center’s plans mark a change in direction from a previously planned new build on a Livermore Street parcel the nonprofit purchased from Antioch College in December 2023.
Finance Committee update
Council President Gavin DeVore Leonard reported out from the most recent Finance Committee meeting, April 14.
He noted that the committee and Village staffers are getting closer to a more “realistic” approach to the annual budgeting process — one that doesn’t rely quite as heavily on the Village’s typical approach of conservatively over estimating expenses, while underestimating revenues.
“By making changes to revenue projections — primarily the income tax — and expenses — primarily actual staff and benefits levels … the projected 2035 cash situation goes from just over $14 million over budget to around $1.5 million over budget,” DeVore Leonard wrote in a memo to Council.
As an example, he noted that Village employees have never used all of their benefits, so in his view, the Village needn’t budget for that impossibility.
DeVore Leonard said that, while this was good news, the Finance Committee still has work to do, specifically in accurately projecting capital expenses — generally large infrastructure improvements or maintenance projects that can cost millions of dollars.
“So, if we can effectively map our capital expenses … we will have a much higher likelihood of not being caught with budget surprises in the future,” DeVore Leonard wrote.
The next Village Council meeting will be Monday, May 5, at 6 p.m. in the John Bryan Community Center.
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