NORWICH — A nearly year-long effort to rewrite Norwich’s Town Plan to better address the shortage of affordable housing is nearing completion after officials voted last week to approve a draft housing chapter, one of seven sections that will make up the town’s guiding document.

The Planning Commission voted, 7-1, on Thursday to put forward plans calling for the “development of dedicated affordable housing” and “lower-cost housing types.”

The group intends to take a vote on the full Town Plan on Dec. 6. A public hearing likely would follow in January, according to Rod Francis, Norwich’s planning and zoning director.

The draft plan deviates “substantially” from one approved by the Selectboard last year by focusing on ways to attract affordable housing and combating climate change, Francis said Monday.

Norwich doesn’t have much of a choice. Its 2018 plan was rejected by the Two Rivers-Ottauquechee Regional Commission for failing to set goals for multifamily and affordable housing.

Without regional approval, Norwich could lose out on municipal planning grants, be disqualified from Vermont’s “downtown and village center” tax credit program and lose deference in the siting of local energy projects under the state’s solar and wind law.

The Planning Commission solicited input from the public and experts several times in crafting the new plan, which attempts to strike a balance to maintain Norwich’s rural character while also attracting business and housing, according to Chairwoman Jaci Allen.

“I think we can make a difference with affordable housing,” she said via phone last week. “We’re never going to do it fast but we can take steps to improve the current situation.”

But the proposal is more visionary than specific. The draft plan suggests making changes to Norwich’s zoning and subdivision regulations to encourage homebuilding. They include allowing for more dense developments, mixed-use buildings and considering whether to require affordable units within larger projects. But the plan doesn’t say what the density might be.

The plan also encourages officials to study alternatives to septic.

Norwich’s School Board is exploring a connection to Hartford’s sewer system as a solution for the Marion Cross School’s failing septic system. The roughly 1.3-mile connection could allow businesses to hook up to the sewer system as well, officials say.

However, resident Stuart Richards worries the proposed changes would encourage “overdevelopment” by inviting large-scale developers to Norwich.

Richards, a retired developer and former Planning Commission member, was a vocal opponent of a 2017 proposal to rezone a corridor along Route 5 for high-density development. Norwich should see “incremental change and growth,” he said in an interview last week.

“People still come to Norwich to live in a small town,” Richards said.

The latest proposed draft met opposition from Ernie Ciccotelli, a Planning Commission member and Norwich attorney, who called the draft “an open door for unintended consequences.”

Rather than continuing to build homes for the “overprivileged,” the town should work to address the low wages and difficult job market that helps to make Norwich unaffordable, he said during Thursday’s meeting.

“I don’t see (the plan) actually increasing affordable housing. I see it increasing development,” he said.

Buff McLaughry, a Norwich resident and real estate agent, countered that the Upper Valley needs housing of all types. In 26 of the Upper Valley’s core towns, only 260 housing units are being constructed annually, he said, citing research from Vital Communities.

“That’s a really scary number,” he said, adding efforts to build new homes are “in a stalemate.”

Francis, the Norwich planning and zoning director, and Peter Gregory, executive director of Two Rivers, said on Monday that the new proposed Town Plan addresses the concerns the regional group raised with last year’s proposal.

“From what we’ve seen so far, what they’re doing is in alignment with state statutes” and the regional plan, Gregory said in a phone interview.

Tim Camerato can be reached at tcamerato@vnews.com or 603-727-3223.