For those who live in such neighborhoods, large homes on large lots may seem the epitome of the American Dream. The uglier truth, however, is that too many Connecticut residents for too long have been shut out of home ownership and too many struggle to pay market-rate rents. This is largely because of restrictive zoning that encourages large-lot, single-family development. It results in much of the state’s housing being a financial pipe dream for low- and even moderate-income residents. This includes many young people who may want to live in the town in which they grew up, and those who work in such vital professions as teaching, firefighting and law enforcement.

High property costs and restrictive zoning regulations make it next to impossible, even should developers desire to do so, to build more affordable housing such as duplex and multi-family units, clustered housing or smaller homes on smaller lots.

A standoff over a proposal to build multifamily housing on a 1.5 acre residential property in Woodbridge has broad implications for zoning laws in other towns across Connecticut — a state with the 10th-highest housing wage in the U.S., according to the National Low Income Housing Commission, and where the average two-bedroom rental has a fair market rate of $1,374 per month.

For resident Matt McDermott, it is time for the town “to take stock” of how its zoning rules have impacted housing and what that has meant for the region.

McDermott spoke as the Plan and Zoning Commission aired a proposal to modify its land use policies to allow for higher density, affordable housing stock.

The hearing drew some support for the proposed change.

“Over the last 80 years, we have only sought to increase our lot sizes,” said McDermott.

“Now is a moment in time for us to take stock of what this has done to our community,” he said. “Our zoning has locked in racial and economic privilege.”

A high school senior, a septuagenarian social worker, a military veteran, and a recent immigrant from Latin America reached into their pasts to buttress arguments for and against allowing more multi-family affordable housing in the leafy New Haven suburb of Woodbridge.

They were among 16 Woodbridge residents who testified Monday night during an hour-long special meeting of the Woodbridge Town Planning & Zoning Commission.

The sole subject of the online special public hearing was a two-pronged proposal submitted by civil-rights attorneys and law students looking to make it easier for developers to build multi-family affordable housing in Woodbridge.

When it came time sell this particular 5-bedroom home in Woodbridge, located on a 1.5 acre lot studded with trees, the realtor pitched the house to prospective buyers with these inducements: “Location, location, location,” the ad proclaimed, adding that the “expansive home” has a floor plan capable of “accommodating anyone and everyone.”

The property – located just off the route taken by local politicians and residents as they marched over the summer chanting “Black Lives Matter” and toting signs that read “End White Silence” – is now at the center of a controversial proposal that challenges the town’s so-called “snob zoning,” which civil rights attorneys argue keeps Woodbridge segregated.

Civil-rights speakers threw down the gauntlet: “Snob” Woodbridge promotes segregation through exclusionary zoning.

Woodbridgers pushed back: “Elitist” interlopers have no business labeling their liberal ‘burb racist and trying to change their zoning laws.

That debate — the latest chapter in an ongoing quest to address affordable housing and racial segregation regionally rather than community-by-community — played out Monday night during a special meeting of the Woodbridge Town Planning & Zoning Commission. The nearly three-hour public hearing was held online on YouTube Live.

A group of former residents from Hartford’s North End is taking on the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The Center for Leadership and Justice filed suit on their behalf Wednesday, claiming that HUD failed to reduce segregation when giving them options for new housing.

Tenants endured black mold hanging from the ceiling. Mothers watched mice run through their children’s cribs on the baby monitor. These were among the claims detailed by members of the groups filing the suit outside Barbour Garden Apartments Wednesday.

For years, Marina Ilarraza’s family lived in a government-subsidized apartment in Hartford’s North End where mold adorned the shower, the windows wouldn’t shut, the heat worked sporadically and the water ran brown.

In the basement, a sewage backup left behind fleas and rotting cats. Drug violence in the neighborhood often prevented her children from playing outside.

She wanted out but had few options – until 2019, when the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development ended the last of its contracts with the landlords of the Ilarrazas’ apartment and two others in the city because of the deplorable conditions inside.

A coalition of state and national civil rights groups filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in federal court on Thursday, claiming that a new Trump administration rule will make it much more difficult to challenge unfair housing practices in Connecticut and Rhode Island.