The Dillon Town Council has opted to hold off on passing regulations that would have required developers building new residential projects in town to contribute to the local workforce housing stock.

The council has been discussing the regulations, known as “inclusionary housing” requirements, since the summer. But on Dec. 10, the Town Council rejected an ordinance 5-2 that would have enacted inclusionary housing requirements, with only the mayor and one member voting in favor.

Dillon senior town planner Ned West told the council that the ordinance, as presented, requires all residential land use applications of 10 or more units to provide workforce housing at a rate of 10% of the total proposed housing units.

West said that the ordinance provides options for the developer to provide the workforce housing units on site as part of their planned development or off-site at a different location in Dillon or Summit County.

West also noted that the ordinance included provisions allowing the developer to buy and deed-restrict existing housing to meet the 10% requirement or pay a fee in lieu of providing workforce housing.

He said the ordinance does not outline what the fee in lieu of providing workforce housing would be but that the council could set that by ordinance.

The council members who voted to table the resolution said that they required more time to consider the housing requirements.

“There’s a lot of questions that still need to be answered,” Councilmember Rachel Tuyn said. “There is a lot of ambiguity in the (ordinance), and I think there’s some things that we need to figure out and put down in a more concrete way, the in-lieu-of (fee) and the cost of developing off-site, things like that.”

Councilmember Dana Christiansen questioned whether the inclusionary housing requirements could hinder workforce housing development in town, because the town has in some cases negotiated greater than 10% workforce housing with developers. Christiansen noted the Sail Lofts development that agreed to closer to 25% workforce housing when it was approved.

West said, however, that he believes that the inclusionary housing requirements could help the town set a baseline so that developers understand what is expected of them when they pitch a project.

“I think the challenge is that every time a developer first comes to us, we have to say, ‘You better not offer anything whatsoever unless you’re considering workforce housing,’ ” West said. “That doesn’t help people come to the town with prospective concepts. So, that’s perhaps what has inhibited potential redevelopment concepts over the years.”

Councilmember Oliver Luck described the ordinance as “pretty complex” and asked whether the town raising its $2-per-square-foot workforce housing impact fee would be a simpler way of raising funds for workforce housing.

West noted that unlike the inclusionary housing ordinance, increasing the impact fee would not only impact multifamily residential projects but also would impact someone building a single-family home or proposing commercial development.

Mayor Carolyn Skowyra expressed her support for the inclusionary housing ordinance, stating, “I don’t think this is complex.” Skowyra said that the ordinance sets the expectation that developers provide that 10% of total units are workforce housing or otherwise pay what the equivalent of what it would cost the town to build those units.