Anchorage Assembly leaders propose keeping multifamily design rules on hold through 2035

Anchorage's rules on how new apartment buildings and townhouses must look would stay on hold through the end of 2035 under a proposal from the Assembly's two top leaders.

Assembly Chair Anna Brawley and Vice Chair Daniel Volland want to extend the city's pause on residential design standards for multifamily and townhouse projects with five or more units by more than seven years. The pause now ends May 31, 2028. What counts is when a complete application is filed, not when construction starts.

The paused rules govern things like how a building's walls are broken up, its exterior finishes, decorative features and rooflines. When the Assembly approved the pause in February 2025, the idea was to give developers more flexibility while the city drafted new standards.

Their ordinance says the city has raised its estimate of the new and rehabilitated homes it needs to more than 12,000, citing more than 2,500 additional personnel expected at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson and potential projects such as the LNG pipeline.

It also says developers are already planning projects that may not be permitted until after 2028. And it says any major update of the city's long-range Comprehensive Plan, which the ordinance says should revisit whether and how Anchorage uses design standards, would take years. The city is in the early stages of considering one.

Several developers told an Assembly work session in August that the pause was part of what helped their projects "pencil," or make financial sense, in some cases letting them fit more units on a property. A preliminary Planning Department analysis linked the pause to a modest reduction in zoning review time, but said more data is needed to measure its full effect.

Cook Inlet Housing Authority asked the Assembly in August to make the pause permanent. When the pause was first proposed, community council participants wanted something narrower.

The proposal would end one related exemption. Multifamily and townhouse projects have been exempt from the city's building-frontage standards since 2025, and those standards would apply again to applications filed after the ordinance takes effect.

Some rules never stopped applying. Hotels and dormitories still have to meet the design standards, and multifamily projects still have to screen mechanical and electrical equipment from view.

The Assembly has a public hearing set for Dec. 15. The ordinance would skip review by the Planning and Zoning Commission and take effect as soon as it passes. The Planning Department would have to report to the Assembly each year on how well the pause is encouraging multifamily development.