LEWES, Del. -- Officials in Lewes are considering allowing accessory dwelling units or ADUs to help the city's affordable housing issue.
Accessory dwelling units are compact living areas with separate amenities that share property with a larger, primary home. They're often created by transforming an attic, detached garage, or basement or by constructing a separate living space.
According to city manager Ann Marie Townshend, the goal is to create long-term, affordable, workforce housing for people like nurses, teachers, waiters, and police officers.
"What we see is long commute time, or in some cases, we've seen employers are struggling to get employees to work at their restaurant, at the school district, or at the hospital," says Townshend. "It's something all employers are seeing."
Longtime neighbor Winona Dougherty has experienced the issue herself with a cleaning service that could no longer work because of a long commute. She's not sure adding on to homes or welcoming people inside your home for an ADU is a good solution.
"I don't know that there's that much land left in Lewes to add on because it's a small town and people have used up the property, so I don't know that that's possible within city limits," says Dougherty.
Michiko Seto owns six stores in downtown Lewes. Her worker shortage is at its worst because people can't afford to live nearby. She says she can understand why neighbors would be concerned, but she fully supports ADUs.
"I can see both sides of this, because I can see some people might get concerned about the value of their property and so forth," says Seto. "I understand that. But I also know, we've got to worry about our quality of life down here. It's frustrating if you can't go out because restaurants don't have enough help to open up for lunch and dinner or seven days a week or whatever it is!"
Other neighbors have raised concerns about people using a space meant for an ADU as a short-term rental for vacationers. Townshend says officials are discussing strategies to ensure that does not happen.
"We can allow only long term rentals as accessory dwelling units," says Townshend. "So we would be able to restrict it to those long term rentals so that it doesn't become another vacation rental that doesn't help solve the problem."
ADUs are currently illegal in Lewes. Townshend says she thinks they may have been prohibited because people weren't conforming to the rules in the past. However, she says Milford and other surrounding towns are allowing and considering ADUs as a form of affordable housing.
ADUs will be discussed at the next housing subcommittee meeting on July 18th.