When it comes to building more housing to meet what almost everyone agrees is an urgent need, New Hampshire seems to be of two minds — or maybe three.

There’s the New Hampshire whose Legislature this year passed a package of reforms designed to promote housing development throughout the state by eliminating barriers erected by local zoning rules.

Then there’s the New Hampshire Municipal Association and its allies, which want to repeal those new laws before they can take effect.

And last, but certainly not least, there’s the people of New Hampshire, who pretty consistently tell pollsters that the state’s lack of affordable housing is their number one concern.

Of course, it’s rare for any state to speak with one voice on any matter of public concern, but the divide seems especially sharp on this issue.

The reforms passed by the Legislature and endorsed by Gov. Kelly Ayotte during the past session proposed to address the housing shortage in several ways: by expanding the number of accessory dwelling units property owners have the right to build; by allowing development on Class VI roads, which towns are not obliged to maintain; by barring localities from requiring a specified number of parking spaces for new housing units; and by requiring cities and towns to allow housing development in commercial zones, with some exceptions.

While there are many other barriers to housing development — including interest rates, the spiraling cost of building materials, shortages of skilled workers, tariffs — local zoning rules undoubtedly play a big role. With that said, it is possible to question the wisdom of any one element of the reform package.

But as the New Hampshire Bulletin news site reported recently, the municipal association, which is a lobbyist for selectboards and planning boards, has mobilized opposition to the whole package, and legislators have already filed a dozen bills for 2026 seeking to repeal the measures.

Opponents of the new laws have several objections, but the two main ones appear to be that they override the principle of local control and that the free market will exert sufficient pressure on cities and towns to voluntarily increase the housing stock.

The free market argument fails on its face. The acute shortage of housing development in New Hampshire is of long duration, and if the free market were going to supply that demand, it would long since have done so. In fact, the leading developer of affordable housing in the Upper Valley is the nonprofit Twin Pines Housing.

As to local control, that is a dead issue in New Hampshire. Despite its supposedly libertarian bent, the Legislature is very comfortable dictating to local communities, institutions and individuals what they may and may not do, whether it’s how history is taught and who is represented in that history; what health care may be provided and received; how communities police themselves, and so on and on.

Rep. Len Turcotte, R-Barrington, is a leader of the repeal effort and has been traveling the state to get his message out, which is that “the towns and the citizens themselves almost 100% are against these (laws).” Yet, a poll in August conducted by St. Anselm College found that 78% of respondents believed that their community needed to build more affordable housing. So which thing is true?

Perhaps both. The municipal association and its allies represent people who have a vested interest in the status quo. A housing shortage props up the skyrocketing sales prices for existing homes to be sure. But it’s also the case that many people simply like their communities the way they are, and housing development on any large scale threatens to undermine what they like most about where they live. While they may agree in the abstract that more housing is needed throughout the state, as a practical matter they don’t want much of it in their own town. We understand that argument, but it does leave out an important consideration, which is what obligation current residents have to the future.

It is also probable that the poll respondents include many people who need and want different housing arrangements from the ones they have at present. Those people, however, often do not have a seat at the table when housing projects are reviewed at the local level, where opposition is often fierce. Thus their voice is muted.

There are, of course, other ways in which New Hampshire could promote more housing development. One would be by direct state investment in worthy projects or in the municipal infrastructure necessary to build them; another would be to provide meaningful financial incentives for communities to streamline development rules; or to set specific development requirements based on the size of individual communities and let the localities figure out how to meet them.

But we are inclined to think that waiting to see how the reforms work before dismantling them has a lot to recommend it.