MA Senate Passes Bill With $3.5 Million In Cape Housing Relief

BARNSTABLE COUNTY, MA — The state senate passed a new COVID-19 relief bill that includes $3.5 million to help home renters on Cape Cod.

S.2564, also known as "An act relative to immediate COVID-19 recovery needs, allocates money from President Joe Biden's American Rescue Plan. State Sens. Julian Cyr, (D-Truro), and Susan Moran (D–Falmouth), said if the bill becomes law, it will help boost the Cape's rental housing stock and provide rental subsidies for early educators and human service workers.

"If we do not fundamentally change our course on housing, year-round working communities on Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and Nantucket will continue to erode,” Cyr said in a statement Monday. "The price of housing in this special place has climbed exponentially so that working families who do not have a foothold here simply cannot make it."

Under the bill, most of the $3.5 million would be directed to the Housing Assistance Corporation (HAC), a Cape Cod non-profit that helps residents across the region secure housing. The nonprofit also runs homeless shelters and develops new housing.

The housing affordability crisis across Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and Nantucket has been ballooning for decades, but the COVID-19 pandemic and its aftermath pushed the crisis to a tipping point. According to the Cape Cod and Islands Association of Realtors, the residential median sales price in Barnstable County is $640,000 as of October 2021. That's a 23 percent increase between 2020 and 2021.

Inventory of housing stock in the region also remains constricted. Supply of inventory in Barnstable County decreased 38.1 percent for single-family units and 40.7 percent for condominiums in October 2021 compared to the previous year.

"The situation on Cape Cod has reached a point where young families are being completely shut out of the market because we have such a severe lack of affordable housing," Moran said. "Today, my partnership with Senator Julian Cyr to use ARPA funding to tackle the housing crisis has paid off, and we are going to see an unprecedented investment into our region’s affordable housing supply."

The bill will now go before the state House of Representatives before going to Gov. Charlie Baker's desk for his signature.