Nicole Watts, District 9 County Legislator, hosts Syracuse's Northside Issues Forum on Housing Monday, February 16, 2026, at North Side Learning Center. Northsiders talked about and brainstorm solutions to housing issues during the event. Watts takes notes as Manika Gautam, middle, and Sean Diaz, McCarthy, a Syracuse University political science senior, presents their housing solutions to attendees. Credit: Michelle Gabel | Central Current

After months of conversation, Onondaga County’s new Housing and Transportation Citizen’s Advisory Board is set to unveil a draft proposal of ideas to remedy the region’s housing and transportation crises. 

Their ideas include:

  • A no-to-low interest loan fund to help increase the supply of housing
  • Drafting new zoning language municipalities can adopt to allow for new kinds of housing in their communities
  • Ensuring that major county roads are accessible to bikers and pedestrians. 

“We are already seeing homelessness on the rise, housing instability on the rise, rising rent costs that are just untenable for folks of all different income levels, and the vulnerable are being made more vulnerable in the midst of these changes,” said Nicole Watts, the chair of the legislature and co-chair of the board. “And we’re expecting more people to move to the area. So we’re expecting to need more supply.” 

Watts introduced the proposal at a Wednesday meeting of the Planning and Economic Development committee. 

Increasing housing supply has become a bipartisan issue. Studies suggest that with Central New York’s predicted growth over the upcoming decades, the six-county region will need to build about 3,000 homes per year for the next ten years. 

The county government is limited in what it can do without support from towns. New York state law assigns zoning rights through municipal home rule. That means the county can’t change or violate the zoning codes that each town has chosen for itself. 

“The county has this very unique space when it comes to housing where we don’t have very much authority, but I think we have a lot of opportunity for influence,” said Watts. 

The board proposes that the county create a local development corporation focused on addressing housing issues in the county. That LDC would get seed funding from Onondaga County but would also be able to receive funding from elsewhere in the state. It would have a board of its own which could continue to make housing decisions. 

The LDC would house programs for the county, including a no-to-low interest loan fund to increase housing supply and a program allowing builders to yield collective purchasing power to drive down the cost of building materials. 

In addition to the LDC, the board proposed the county draft language municipalities could adopt to change their zoning policies. It would also require major county roads to be made accessible to bikes and pedestrians, and would create a standard ensuring the legislature only approved funding to road projects if they met a certain metric of accessibility. 


The county would also attempt to tap into preexisting local pipelines to channel local workers into building projects. 

Some Republicans expressed support for the proposal at Wednesday’s committee meeting. 

The county may consider other ideas in the future. A recent visit to PUSH Buffalo, a nonprofit focused on expanding housing and advancing justice in Buffalo, made Housing and Transportation board members interested in identifying and purchasing land and properties to control the prices available to residents. Board co-chair Darrell Buckingham called the move a “key piece that’s not in our particular wheelhouse.” 

The Housing and Transportation Citizen’s Advisory Board was founded in April. It was launched with a housing summit which brought together county and municipal politicians to discuss problems and solutions in the county’s housing system. There were also a series of local forums for community members on the subject.

The board aimed to convene people from different sides of the community — developers, tenants’ rights activists, landlords and more — to develop solutions together. The board’s proposed actions do not duplicate preexisting county programs, said Watts. 

The full proposals will be revealed with an opportunity for public comment at an open house at the Inspyre Innovation Hub on Sept. 1 at 5:30 p.m. 

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Laura Robertson is a staff reporter covering Onondaga County. Prior to joining Central Current, she lived on the edge of the Bering Strait in Nome, Alaska, where she worked as a reporter for a year. She...