There is no more important challenge for Gov. Ned Lamont and lawmakers than taking the policy steps necessary to expand the amount of housing in the state, making it affordable for working people and for those living on the economic margins, and to do so in a way that is equitable, rather than focused on economically challenged urban centers.

In 2022 and 2023 The Day news staff, bolstered by contributions from freelance journalists, took an in-depth look at the housing issue. That reporting outlined the many causes of high housing costs and showed how the lack of reasonably priced housing has economic, moral and educational implications.

Unfortunately, the problem has only grown more severe.

Connecticut ranks eighth in the nation for the cost of rental housing, according to the latest Fair Market Rent estimates for 2024.

In 2024, an estimated $1,170 was enough to pay for 40% of all studio apartments available in Connecticut, according to fair market housing data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Fair Market Rents are estimates of the amount needed to cover rent for 40% of rental units in a town, offering a standard for assessing housing affordability. When FMRs go up, the amount of financial help available to households increases too. HUD also sets income limits for who can qualify for these programs.

In the late 1960s, Ethel Lawrence and her husband lived with their children in a two-story house on an acre of land in Mount Laurel, N.J. Her family had lived in the township for generations, and she wanted her children to be able to live there, too. But the area was changing, fast.

The township, near Philadelphia, had been home to Black families like the Lawrences since before the Civil War, when it was a stop on the underground railroad. Then, in the decades after World War II, the federal government financed the construction of highways and tracts of single-family homes. White families fleeing cities like Camden, N.J., and Philadelphia tripled Mount Laurel’s population between 1950 and 1970.

When the township sought to condemn an area of dilapidated homes, where some of the town’s Black residents lived, Ms. Lawrence jumped into action. She and her husband owned their home, but Ms. Lawrence was concerned that other Black or Latino residents would be forced out. With a local minister and a community group, she came up with a plan to build 36 new affordable units, even securing $35,000 in state grants to study it. But there was a big hurdle: Mount Laurel’s planning board said the project wasn’t allowed under its zoning code.

With the U.S. in the worst housing affordability crisis of our lifetimes, lawmakers at all levels of government are increasingly feeling pressure to act. In March, President Biden unveiled a housing plan featuring two new tax credits, while state and local leaders across the country are proposing policy measures to protect vulnerable residents and increase the supply of affordable housing.

Connecticut is home to some of the nation's starkest inequality between neighboring school districts, new data shows.

As part of a project examining disparities in education, the Washington D.C.-based think tank New America analyzed thousands of adjacent school systems across the U.S., comparing the median household income of one district against the other. By this measure, previously unpublished data shows, Connecticut is home to 23 of the top 300 most unequal borders in the country, including eight of the top 100.

In most cases, these borders are between the state's largest cities and their suburbs, though in some instances the disadvantaged district is a small city or suburb. The border between Hartford and South Windsor represents the starkest disparity, followed by Hartford and West Hartford, Bridgeport and Fairfield, Bridgeport and Trumbull, and Waterbury and Cheshire.

For the first time, the Housing Authority of New Haven is providing site-based housing vouchers outside of the Elm City itself, covering 40 low-income apartments in the town of Branford.

As housing advocates continue to push for a state bill that would allow local public housing agencies to build apartments in nearby towns, the Housing Authority of New Haven (HANH) is testing an alternative approach to funding affordable housing out of town: using the federal ​“Section 8” Housing Choice Voucher program, which the agency administers on a local level.

The need for housing assistance has rapidly outpaced voucher supply in the northeast, leaving tens of thousands of people on waitlists that often only open every few years, representatives from three states said Thursday.

Housing officials from Connecticut, New Jersey and Massachusetts spoke at a housing forum in Hartford on Thursday. Partnership for Strong Communities organized the event, which focused on rental assistance and voucher programs. These programs aim to offset rent costs for people with low incomes. In most programs, having a voucher means the government pays a portion of the tenant’s rent.

Connecticut is one of the most racially and economically segregated places in the country and both forms of division are increasing in at least some areas of the state, according to a new state-funded study.

Black and Latino residents are concerned about health care, tipped wages, traffic enforcement, cash advance apps, community college funding and psilocybin decriminalization, among other things, and they want their legislators to take action.

That was the message at a recent virtual public policy forum, hosted by the Connecticut General Assembly Black and Puerto Rican Caucus, that drew more than 600 viewers for a constituent-led discussion on the issues affecting Black and Latino residents ahead of the 2024 legislative session.

In the nearly eight months Christiana Anderson has been staying at a New London shelter, there were a few times she thought she’d found an apartment for herself and her teenage son.

But each time, the option fell through.

Anderson lost her housing in January, after her son had behavioral problems and the family members she was staying with decided they didn’t want them there anymore. “I was shaky. I was just thinking of how this could have happened to me,” she said of the day she lost her place to live.

Anderson is one of many people experiencing homelessness who are spending months looking for a new place to live in Connecticut, faced with high rent costs and a dearth of housing they can afford.