“This still is far more dense than anything that we currently have in the region,” Vettraino said, adding that Hamtramck is the densest city in Michigan at 18 housing units per acre, followed by Detroit at 12, Ypsilanti at nine and Center Line at eight.

The smallest lot sizes in Sterling Heights are 7,200 square feet, which are typically 60 feet by 120 feet, said City Planner Jake Parcell, which equates to just under six homes per acre.

Sterling Heights City Manager Mark Vanderpool said a few thousand housing units need to be built in the city in the coming years.

“Now, is it smarter to do it in the way we’ve been doing it, or is it better to have legislation that just mandates density anywhere in the community residential areas?” Vanderpool said.

The city manager pointed to the Lakeside City Center project, which will include “a couple thousand” housing units. The project will turn the Lakeside Mall property on M-59 into a mixed-use center, with restaurants, hotels, housing, park space and more.

Officials debate setback concerns

In Oakland County, which is home to hundreds of lakes, officials worried that reduced setbacks — meaning the space between where a property line starts and where a housing unit is built — could put developments too close to wetlands.

Orion Township Supervisor Chris Barnett said his community has had “major flooding” in recent years — something he said the proposed bills don’t take into consideration.

The Oakland County Board of Commissioners passed a resolution opposing the bills out of committee in March. Gwen Markham, a Democratic county commissioner from Novi, said the setback for wetlands in the county is currently 50 feet. One legislative proposal would allow up to a 25-foot setback from wetlands, inland lakes or streams, and high-water marks for the Great Lakes and Lake St. Clair, according to the SEMCOG summary.

“Wetland setbacks protect buildings, whether it’s homes or businesses or public buildings,” Markham said.

“The local officials don’t feel as though you can just tell us across the board, ‘You need to be able to do this.’”

Ann Arbor City Councilwoman Lisa Disch disagreed, arguing that Oakland County could create natural feature protections in its zoning code that would address bodies of water and coexist with the proposed rules.

Macomb officials worry that communities could be ‘upended’

Macomb Township Supervisor Frank Viviano said that when he and his wife were deciding where they wanted to raise their family, they chose an area where they thought they could “get value” and liked the surrounding community.

“Now, if these bills were to go through, the community that I invested to, and the community that literally hundreds of thousands of southeast Michigan residents invested into, could be upended, meaning that we could have a duplex next to us, five feet from our property line,” Viviano said.

Clinton Township Supervisor Paul Gieleghem said he and other township officials believe the proposed changes would reduce property values.

“Reducing the value of someone’s home is literally pulling money from them,” Gieleghem said, adding that a family’s single largest investment.

“We are for development and affordable housing options, but where the infrastructure exists to be able to support it,” Gieleghem said.

Kelly Karll, the manager of SEMCOG’s environment and infrastructure group, said municipal engineers are responsible for making sure roads, water, sewer and stormwater lines in an area can safely support what’s being built.

“So when the state overrides local control with one-size-fits-all-type mandates like this, it breaks that connection between development decisions and the capacity checks that engineers are required to make,” she said.

Karll said the bills would allow “major increases” in density in places where infrastructure was sized for a significantly lower level of use.

But Rep. Aragona said he and the other lawmakers are not trying to “overwhelm any type of system.” If they have to amend the legislation to ensure that infrastructure isn’t overwhelmed, they will, he said.