There are affordable housing units built in towns across Connecticut, often amid controversy and despite some public outcry.

The arguments against affordable housing often center around a town’s right to self-determination, to define the look, feel and character of a community, without interference from state officials.

Advocates say affordable housing is an economic imperative, and that racism and classism are often undercurrents beneath opposition to new developments.

In the town of Fairfield, Conn., nearly 2,400 residents have signed a petition opposing a project proposed for downtown that could bring 19 units of affordable housing.

In nearby New Canaan, homeowners have raised about $84,000 for a legal fund to fight a proposed apartment complex downtown on Weed Street that would include 31 rent-restricted units for households with moderate incomes.

And in Greenwich, a developer recently withdrew an application to build a project that would include 58 apartments priced below market rate, after residents living in nearby luxury condominiums objected and said the buildings that would be demolished were historically significant.

The resistance among Connecticut’s wealthier suburbs toward state action on affordable housing often comes down to a pleading for the state tradition of local control. Don’t force action on us, these towns say. We know best how to handle it, and we will work out our own solutions.

The problem is that those solutions have not been forthcoming. Absent a push from the state, towns have been all too successful at building a wall around themselves and keeping out anyone not wealthy enough to buy their way in. These towns have worked to hoard the resources for the best-equipped school districts and leave less desirable elements for other communities to handle.

A group of attorneys and housing advocates filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the town of Woodbridge alleging its zoning policies violate the state’s Fair Housing Act and portions of the state constitution by restricting the number of multi-family units that can be built.

The lawsuit is a move advocates believe could have far-reaching implications on state and national housing and zoning policy by building a model for other communities to push back on restrictive zoning policies. The plaintiffs want the town to plan and zone for its “fair share” of affordable housing, a policy housing advocates pushed for during the last legislative session.

A coalition of affordable housing advocates filed suit in New Haven Tuesday against the town of Woodbridge over zoning regulations that prevent multi-family housing in the vast majority of the town.

The fair housing advocacy organization Open Communities Trust, the Stamford-based affordable housing developer Garden Homes Fund, an affiliate LLC of those organizations, and two Woodbridge residents are filing the lawsuit against the town.

The plaintiffs are charging that the town’s restrictions against homes with more than two units violate the Connecticut Zoning Enabling Act, the Connecticut Fair Housing Act, and the state constitution.

Civil rights attorneys and housing advocates have filed a lawsuit against the town of Woodbridge for what they say is a violation of fair-housing laws that aim to make Connecticut towns more equitable and diverse.

Woodbridge, a suburb of New Haven, prohibits multifamily housing of three units or more on most of its residential land. Advocates claim that’s exclusionary zoning, which they say causes a lack of affordable housing that often disproportionately impacts Black and Latino residents in Connecticut.

A statewide civil rights and housing advocacy group is set to file a lawsuit against the Town of Woodbridge and its planning and zoning commission Tuesday, alleging that the local zoning code “unjustifiably restricts” multifamily housing, limiting choices for low-income families, the group told CT Insider.

The lawsuit by the Hartford-based Open Communities Alliance claims Woodbridge’s zoning regulations violate the Connecticut Fair Housing Act, the state’s new zoning reform law and the state constitution. It asks a judge to bar certain elements of the town’s zoning code and require new policies to promote affordable housing.

Despite five years of advance notice that Connecticut towns would have to submit affordable housing plans by June 1, less than half of them made the deadline.

The deadline — established by a 2017 law that requires such plans every five years —marked an important date for affordable housing advocates in Connecticut.

As of Thursday, just 46% of the state’s towns had submitted plans to the Office of Policy and Management. Nineteen percent of the towns “proactively notified” the office that they wouldn’t meet the deadline and provided an anticipated date.

The killing of George Floyd in May of 2020 sparked a long-needed racial consciousness awakening across the United States with people of all races filling the streets in cities, suburbs, and rural areas in protest. This energy has been channeled into heightened “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” efforts at corporations and foundations, calls to “defund” the police, accelerated efforts to end mass incarceration, and much more, running the gamut from window dressing to deep and meaningful structural change. The housing sectors—non-profit and for profit, builders, financial institutions, and government agencies—are examining their systems and practices. The pressing question is, how do we make this moment mean something?

The demand for affordable housing is strong, in Glastonbury and across the state.

Connecticut lacks about 85,000 affordable units for extremely low-income renters, according to National Low Income Housing Coalition estimates. Glastonbury’s multifamily rental properties have been “functionally zero” in recent years, according to John Guszkowski, co-founder and Principal at Tyche Planning & Policy Group .The current waitlist for property owned by the Glastonbury Housing Authority has more than 1,100 names.