The early returns on a plan to pre-permit sites for new housing development in Jamestown are good.

Crystal Surdyk, city development director, and Kacie Foulk, city deputy director of housing policy and development, have done a good job of coming up with an idea that could make neighborhoods that have been the brunt of condemned houses and blight over the past two decades an attractive place to build new housing and begin rebuilding neighborhoods. Areas identified so far include sites on Fluvanna Avenue, Spring Street, Fulton Street, Vega and Eagle Streets, Johnson Street, and Cross Street.

We’ve been saying for years that the city needs to do more to help bring more affordable housing online. Unspoken, but true nonetheless, is the fact that the quicker new housing developments happen, the better it is. We need more housing that people can afford to help both with the homeless that we see on the city’s streets now that the weather is warmer, but with the people who find themselves using county emergency housing, which tends to be in hotels, because rents have gone up faster than housing assistance has increased and too many regular, working people simply can’t afford a home anymore.

There is a lot of information that we don’t have yet. Surdy and her team have more work to do behind the scenes before the City Council can approve pre-permitting of sites. The city still needs to figure out utility needs in those areas and work with the Planning Commission and Zoning Board of Appeals before a proposal is finalized. One thing we do hope is kept in mind is public comment. Pre-permitting makes a lot of sense, but the process should still be as transparent as possible. That’s especially true for homeowners on some of the streets being discussed who have owned their homes for decades and should have a say in what type of project is pre-permitted.

Working with neighbors early in the process rather than at the end of the process may get the community on board with new housing proposals rather than the fights that we have seen over the years whenever an affordable housing proposal is brought to the city.

In the grand scheme of things, however, pre-permitting of housing projects should be a good thing for Jamestown. There is something to be said for having necessary approvals quickly rather than after a couple of months – and perhaps having approvals set early can help developers access state funding for these projects more quickly than we have been able to in the past.