The housing proffer from developer East West Communities was the first such provision ever included in a zoning case in Henrico, officials said when Arcadia was approved early last year. “If you are talking about making some sort of impact on the market, you’re not going to be able to do it by doing five or 10 homes,” Vithoulkas told the board. “We had not verbalized it in a report, but with the shortage of affordable housing, we wanted to make the development community aware of the (MWCLT) opportunity,” Emerson said in an email to BizSense. “We’ve got to do something that maybe local government hasn’t really stumbled into,” Nelson said, noting local and national efforts to address the issue, such as the City of Richmond’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund and housing crisis declaration last year. “We’ve got to find a way to start to get into this place where we are making housing affordable,” Nelson said.
