Housing and Communities: who decides

Housing and Communities decisions in the United States are made mostly by local governments, which control zoning and land use, within limits set by state legislatures and federal law. The federal government enforces fair housing law, funds rental assistance through roughly 2,000 local public housing agencies, and finances affordable construction through tax credits that states allocate. A housing priority therefore has many addresses, and the one that matters most is often the city council or county board that writes the zoning code.

In plain words

If you are worried about housing, start with your city or county. They usually decide what can be built where: houses only, apartments, shops, how tall and how close together.

Your state makes the rules your city must follow. More states now tell cities they must allow certain kinds of homes, such as small backyard units. Your state also sets most landlord and tenant law.

The federal government bans discrimination in housing, pays for rent vouchers that local agencies hand out, and offers tax credits that help build affordable apartments. Courts decide where all of these powers stop.

Defined terms

Zoning and land use. Local rules on what may be built where and how, adopted under state enabling laws.

Police power. The general authority of states, often delegated to local governments, to regulate for health, safety and welfare.

Preemption. A higher level of government overriding or limiting the power of a lower one, as when a state requires cities to allow certain housing types.

Public housing agency (PHA). A local or regional body that administers federal housing programs such as Housing Choice Vouchers.

Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC). A federal tax credit for building or rehabilitating rental housing with rent-restricted units, allocated by state housing credit agencies.

Fair housing. Federal law prohibiting discrimination in the sale, rental and financing of housing.

Evidence: the local role in housing and communities

Local governments hold the most direct power over housing supply. Cities and counties adopt zoning codes, approve or deny projects, set permit fees and processes, and decide how much land is open to apartments versus single-family homes.

That power rests on a 1926 Supreme Court decision. In Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co., decided November 22, 1926, the Court upheld a village zoning ordinance as a valid exercise of the police power, finding that “the ordinance in its general scope and dominant features” was valid.⁠¹ Zoning has been a standard local tool ever since.

Local governments also run many community services that the demo’s scope includes: parks, libraries, code enforcement, and in many places homeless services. The Census Bureau counted 90,837 local governments in 2022,⁠² and in many regions a single housing market spans dozens of separate cities and counties, each with its own zoning code.

Local governments also decide how to respond to homelessness in public spaces, within constitutional limits. In City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, decided June 28, 2024, the Supreme Court held that enforcing generally applicable laws regulating camping on public property does not constitute cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment.⁠³ The holding rejected the Ninth Circuit rule from Martin v. Boise, which had barred such enforcement whenever a jurisdiction’s homeless population exceeded its “practically available” shelter beds,⁠³ returning that choice to local governments and state law.

The state role in housing and communities

States make the rules within which local governments operate, and they set most landlord and tenant law, including eviction procedures, security deposits and, where allowed, rent regulation.

States increasingly preempt local zoning to require more housing. Oregon’s House Bill 2001 (2019) requires cities with more than 10,000 people, or within the Portland-area Metro, to allow duplexes on land zoned for single-family dwellings inside the urban growth boundary, and requires Metro cities and counties and cities over 25,000 to allow “middle housing” in residential zones.⁠⁴ It also directs a state commission to write model ordinances that apply if cities do not amend their own codes.⁠⁴ The Joint Center for Housing Studies reports that 14 states now preempt local limits on accessory dwelling units in some capacity, with Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii and Massachusetts joining in 2024.⁠⁵

States also allocate federal housing tax credits. Under 26 U.S.C. § 42(h), “the State housing credit ceiling for each calendar year shall be allocated to the housing credit agency of such State”.⁠⁶ State agencies therefore decide which affordable projects receive credits, using criteria they publish.

The federal role in housing and communities

The federal government shapes housing through civil rights law, rental assistance, tax policy and mortgage finance, but it does not control local zoning.

Fair housing. The Fair Housing Act makes it unlawful “to refuse to sell or rent after the making of a bona fide offer, or to refuse to negotiate for the sale or rental of, or otherwise make unavailable or deny, a dwelling to any person because of race, color, religion, sex, familial status, or national origin”.⁠⁷

Rental assistance. The Housing Choice Voucher program is funded by HUD and run by local public housing agencies; HUD says roughly 2,000 PHAs administer their own voucher programs, and applicants apply through their local agency.⁠⁸ HUD states that families generally must be “extremely low-income or very low-income to qualify”.⁠⁸ Because funding is limited, local agencies decide waiting list rules within federal requirements.

Tax credits. The Low-Income Housing Tax Credit, written into the Internal Revenue Code, requires that a qualifying project meet one of two minimum set-asides, including one in which at least 20% of units are rent-restricted and occupied by households at or below 50% of area median income, and another at 40% of units and 60% of area median income.⁠⁶ Congress sets the size of the program; states allocate it.⁠⁶

A map of housing and communities authority

The role of voters and courts in housing and communities

Voters decide some housing questions directly. Depending on state law and local charters, housing bonds, tax levies and some land-use changes can go to the ballot, and in states that allow initiatives, voters can change state housing or tax law. Whether a housing question can go to voters depends on the state constitution and local charter. See Jurisdictions.

Courts set the limits on all of these powers. Euclid established that zoning is generally valid⁠¹ Fair housing law gives people a route to challenge discrimination.⁠⁷ Grants Pass defined how far the Eighth Amendment constrains local homelessness policy.⁠³

Comparative note

Housing authority is organized differently elsewhere, with different results. In Vienna, the city itself is a major landlord: its housing portal reports about 220,000 municipal flats in 1,800 municipal estates housing close to half a million people, plus about 200,000 subsidized cooperative flats.⁠⁹ In that system, the city’s housing decisions are made largely as an owner and builder, not only as a regulator. Whether that model can or should be adapted in the United States is contested; see Housing and Communities.

Competing interpretations of housing authority

People disagree about where housing authority should sit.

Local control. One view holds that residents should decide how their communities change, because they bear the immediate effects and know local conditions. Supporters see state preemption as overriding democratic choices.

State responsibility for regional markets. Another view holds that housing markets are regional and that local governments have incentives to limit building, so states must set minimum requirements, as Oregon did.⁠⁴ Supporters see preemption as correcting a collective action problem.

Federal leverage. A third view holds that the federal government should tie funding to local zoning reform or expand rental assistance to an entitlement. Critics see this as federal overreach into local land use or as unaffordable.

Property rights. A fourth view holds that owners should have more freedom to build on their own land, and that both local and state rules restrict that freedom too much. This view can support some preemption (to remove local barriers) while opposing new mandates.

Application to this framework

• My Vote Forward shows a priority for housing alongside a map of who decides, so participants can see that most land-use levers are local while most funding and civil rights levers are state or federal.
• When a housing proposal is discussed, the framework asks which body has legal authority, who pays and who is affected, including people who might move there. See Proposals.
• Hypothetical example: residents in a town rank Housing and Communities first and many mention rents. The town council controls zoning; the state controls tenant law and may preempt local zoning; HUD funds vouchers run by a regional agency. The framework’s job is to show all three, not to suggest the council alone can fix rents.

Unresolved questions

• How should a framework present housing authority in metropolitan areas split among dozens of local governments?
• Should people who work in a city but live elsewhere have a way to express housing priorities there?
• How often must the authority map be updated, given how quickly states are changing zoning and tenant laws?
• How should results be reported when the deciding body (a state legislature) covers places with opposite housing problems?