LYME — Long thwarted by zoning and infrastructure challenges, the town’s Planning Board will take yet another crack at addressing the regional housing crisis at a meeting on Thursday.

The board has scheduled a forum to get clarification on Upper Valley Lake Sunapee Regional Planning Commission’s 2023 needs assessment and to consider possible solutions to the housing shortage in the region.

The meeting is planned for 7 p.m. in the town offices conference room located at 1 High Street. A Zoom link to the meeting is available on the Planning Board’s website.

Town officials are trying to balance the competing goals of maintaining the rural town’s open space and addressing the region’s growing need for housing.

“The Planning Board is unanimous in wanting to maintain the characteristics of Lyme that residents find so attractive. As we can all agree there is a shortage of housing in the Upper Valley,” Planning Board Chairman Richard Menge wrote in a description of the meeting on Lyme’s town website.

In its 2023assessment, the Planning Commission estimated Lyme will need 145 new housing units by 2040 to meet the needs of the projected population. To meet this goal, the rate of housing growth in Lyme would need to be double what it has been over the past 15 years.

At the meeting, Renee Theall, a housing navigator with the regional commission, is expected to explain these metrics.

“It’s a target but we really try to let our towns and municipalities know there are a lot of factors influencing it,” said Theall in a phone interview.

These factors include vacancy rates, waiting lists for housing and current market data, Theall said.

The Planning Board will seek input from the community on whether it “should actively pursue incentivizing housing opportunities,” according to the meeting description.

“Eventually, the goal is to look at the zoning in Lyme and see if there are ways the town can change it to meet the housing demands,” said Planning and Zoning Administrator David Robbins.

Lyme has a history of efforts to address the housing shortage.

In 1989, the Lyme Affordable Housing Committee (which no longer exists), formed the Lyme Community Housing Trust to provide access to land and promote the construction and maintenance of units for low to moderate income households, the Valley News reported at the time. Membership in the trust cost $2 and 82 Lyme residents signed up at the its inception.

The trust sought land to be developed into housing. The idea was that residents of the houses would own them, but should the residents choose to sell, they would have to be sold at affordable prices, regardless of increased market value.

In 1995, the trust, having not built any homes, disbanded and gave the roughly $5,000 it had accrued to Lyme’s churches to use for affordable housing.

“The complexities of developing affordable housing stock is beyond the capacity of a small group of volunteers in a small town like ours,” Mary Chin, the president of the trust, said to the Valley News at the time it dissolved.

In more recent years, proposals to change zoning ordinances and build new units have been blocked by both the Lyme Zoning Board of Adjustment, or ZBA, and residents.

In 2015, the ZBA unanimously shot down Lock Lyme Lodge’s request for a zoning variance to build a 36-unit co-housing project on Route 10. The board said it did not want to set a precedent to allow other large developments on similar properties.

In 2017, Lyme residents voted 300-226 to reject a zoning amendment that would allow for clustered housing near Post Pond in the center of town.

In 2021, the town’s Planning Board and residents made an attempt to encourage more senior housing.

At Town Meeting in March, residents voted 406-191 to amend the zoning ordinance to allow for senior housing dwellings in the Lyme common district, which is where Main St. is located. Two new senior dwellings were built there in 2022.

However, the amended ordinance was short-lived.

The amendment contained a line stating if a state law “mandates that any provisions or incentives of this Article must be applied to other forms of housing,” the article will terminate once that law is in effect.

In 2023, a state law known as RSA 674:17, which stated that “incentives established for housing for older persons shall be deemed applicable to workforce housing development,” voided the senior housing ordinance amendment.

No new senior housing has been constructed since the ordinance amendment became void, said Robbins.

Beyond zoning challenges, Lyme does not have its own water and sewer infrastructure, adding yet another challenge to new projects.

One possible solution to this, according to Theall, is infill developments, building on land that already has structures with preexisting water and sewer systems.

Theall also mentioned conservation subdivisions, residential areas where the majority of the land remains a protected green space and homes reside clustered on a smaller portion of the site.

“The board is really wanting to understand this and that’s exciting,” said Theall. “I love when towns and municipalities want to inform the public on creative ways to address housing.”

Emma Roth-Wells can be reached at erothwells@vnews.com or 603-727-3242.