11/19/2025

Evolving Tools for Housing Equity & Innovation in Illinois Communities

Inclusionary housing ordinances, often initially implemented with the narrow aims of diversifying housing stock, are now frequently being rearticulated as a means of advancing equitable outcomes. This broadening makes sense. While the national housing crisis impacts all of us, it presents cataclysmic issues for underserved groups. More so, many of these policy tools are in their teenage years of development, offering an established approach while still having room for experimentation and innovation. Taken together, these dynamics put the policy tool in a promising position for advancing community goals.

The City of Evanston’s Inclusionary Housing Ordinance (IHO) is a great example of a living document. The IHO has been revised several times after its adoption in 2007. The most recent changes were made earlier this year, and included tweaks, amongst others, to unit percentage and on-site requirements. The most intriguing change is the adoption of the use of average maximum gross rents, a promising innovation that can be traced back to recent changes in the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program.

Average maximum gross rent requirements work by allowing developers to meet affordability targets by averaging individual unit market-rate discounts rather than applying a flat percentage to each unit. For example, instead of having every affordable unit in a development be priced at a standard 60% Area Median Income (AMI), the average requirements allow for some units to be priced lower or higher -so long as the average rent meets the standard 60% AMI requirement. It’s a simple concept with a big impact. The shift in calculation can make infeasible projects feasible while making housing accessible to the most economically burdened households.

Evanston isn’t alone in its innovation. Since the City of Highland Park’s adoption of its IHO in 2003, at least nine Illinois municipalities have enacted their own inclusionary zoning regulations, with at least five of these having considered some form of revision or modification. Conversations on ways to improve the tool have been varied. They include debates on the use of affordability zones, scaling pricing requirements and the elimination of in-lieu fees. The common thread across communities is that these conversations are both active and lively.

Inclusionary zoning is fertile ground in Illinois and new-adopters now have the benefit to be building on an established foundation. As adoptions have continued and ordinances are revised, policy mechanisms are becoming more sophisticated -meaning there are more opportunities to target underserved groups. As these trends continue, communities may explore how inclusionary policies align with broader equity and access goals.

Communities considering new ordinances, or revising existing ones, can draw on the experiences of other Illinois municipalities for guidance. Along with the communities already identified, other adopters include: Arlington Heights, Chicago, Deerfield, Geneva, Lake Forest, Oak Park, St. Charles, and most recently Skokie. Additional resources in the form of templates, model language, toolkits and case studies can be found at organizations like Grounded Solutions Network.

Written by D.J. Fiore, AICP and the APA-IL's DEI Committee