The University of Kentucky can help solve Lexington’s affordable housing crisis | Opinion
Last month, New York State Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani won a historic victory in the NYC Democratic mayoral primary with a clear message: affording the cost of living. At its heart was the urgent need to address the housing crisis — an issue that touches almost every corner of the United States today.
In Lexington, where I live and teach architecture at the University of Kentucky, housing affordability is a key problem. As someone who has worked on affordable and high-end housing projects, I believe the university could play a positive role in reshaping a city populated with developer-led buildings that disregard local context, history, and community well-being.
A 2024 Affordable Housing Needs Analysis shows that Lexington urgently needs 22,549 new housing units, of which 17,005 are needed for households earning 80% or lower of the $62,908 area median income. Since 2019, rents have surged 47%, outpacing the national average surge of 31%. Starter homes now cost $260,000 to $400,000 to build, pricing out low-income buyers. And community objection to new developments and zoning changes hinders the shift from racially-exclusionary single-family homes to multifamily dwellings.
Meanwhile, Lexington’s largest employer, the University of Kentucky, is thriving in the booming market for both on- and off-campus student housing. This raises the age-old town and gown conundrum: how can the university balance its commitment to students with responsibility to the surrounding community?
To manage increasing freshman enrollment, the University of Kentucky formed a public-private partnership with Tennessee-based Education Realty Trust, mirroring a national trend of unchecked university growth. But as students eventually move off-campus, housing demands will intensify. Meanwhile, UK continues to expand amenities and healthcare facilities, further encroaching on the surrounding community. It’s part of a pattern of urban universities that have been expanding since World War II and permanently displacing primarily Black, Latino, or immigrant neighborhoods to prioritize rising student enrollment. Notably, UK demolished the Black neighborhood of Adamstown in 1949-50 to build the Memorial Coliseum.
The university’s ambiguous role in off-campus private student housing is often overlooked. This month, construction began on East Maxwell Street on a six-story, off-campus student apartment complex across from another recently approved eight-story student apartment complex — both part of a growing cluster of private student apartment buildings near campus.
Other developments around UK stem from a land swap between UK and out-of-state developers specializing in above-market-rate student housing — part of a multibillion-dollar industry across the U.S.
One might conclude that off-campus private student housing alleviates housing shortages and the land swap absolves the university, but such privatization has lasting impacts. As Zak Leonard of the Blue Grass Trust noted, the six-story complex currently under construction replaces twelve affordable National Register-listed homes. These above-market-rate, amenity-rich apartments permanently alter land use and block future mixed or affordable housing configurations, further reinforcing social stratifications. Since 2014, Lexington’s Affordable Housing Fund has added or preserved over 3,500 affordable units, but many—like Greendale’s Kearney Ridge Apartments—remain isolated on the city’s periphery.
Lexington needs affordable housing — and the university can help. Through his work at the Smart Cities Research Lab and his groundbreaking 2021 book “In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities Are Plundering Our Cities,” urbanist and Trinity College Professor Davarian Baldwin highlights mutually beneficial partnerships that place affordable housing on university-led sites. He cites the University of Winnipeg, which created a development corporation to build housing for students and community members at different price points.
While each town and gown relationship is unique, the core concept holds: what if UK adopted community benefits agreements that require affordable housing on university-led developments and extended institutional resources such as free classes, job training, and job guarantees? What if the university contracted with local architecture firms attuned to Lexington’s context and politic, rather than out-of-state conglomerates? As home to Kentucky’s only accredited architecture school, Lexington has the talent pool to lead local housing solutions.
As Lexington’s largest employer, the university is well-positioned and obligated to lead the charge. Doing so would align its daily actions with its stated mission to serve both its student body and the community and Commonwealth of Kentucky.
Leen Katrib is an assistant professor of architecture at the University of Kentucky, a PD Soros Fellow, and a Public Voices Fellow of The OpEd Project.