Key Takeaways

• Utah voters strongly prefer market forces over government regulation in housing, but broadly support specific, targeted reforms at both the state and local level when given concrete policy options.
• Across party lines and governance levels, ADUs, streamlined permitting, and residential development on former commercial sites emerge as the clearest areas of bipartisan support – while eliminating parking minimums and impact fees outright remain the least popular.
• Support for broad state preemption of local zoning is slim and divided overall, but grows considerably when specific reform proposals are on the table – a distinction policymakers should take seriously heading into the interim.

Executive Summary 

As Utah lawmakers head into the legislative interim period, housing affordability will remain a top concern for Utah families, just as it is an ongoing national focus. A key point of ongoing tension is which level of government – state or local – is best suited to change policies to spur additional housing creation. As such, elected officials in Utah need clear and up-to-date information on Utah voters’ perspectives on that question, as an important variable to aid in their decision-making.

To that end, Sutherland Institute commissioned Y2 Analytics to survey Utah voters and gauge reaction to a slew of potential housing reform categories, organized by which entity could deploy those reforms.

The central debate in Utah is not whether housing affordability is a serious issue worth addressing, but rather how to address it, and at what level of government and type of intervention. This report assesses broad approaches that different actors could take to impact housing policy, showing Utah voter preferences for the different approaches by category.