The information contained in this article is not intended as legal advice and may no longer be accurate due to changes in the law. Consult NHMA's legal services or your municipal attorney.
As the 2026 New Hampshire legislative session enters its final months, a number of land use and zoning bills remain in play. While the makeup of the legislature has not changed, the tone has. Legislators have had almost a full year of hindsight on the sweeping zoning preemption measures they enacted in 2025, and many are realizing that the implications of those decisions are more complicated than the rhetoric that propelled them. Bills proposing statewide mandates haven’t gone away, but the runaway train that was the 2025 session has slowed down considerably.
A report in late January by the state Department of Business and Economic Affairs (BEA) injected fresh context to this year’s debate. The report found that cities and towns issued 5,822 building permits in 2024, the most since 2006. The fact that such a high number of permits were issued before the state enacted several statewide land‑use mandates in 2025 significantly undercuts the narrative that local governments have been the primary obstacle to housing production. Instead, the new data reinforces the argument made in NHMA’s recent whitepaper, Room for Everyone, which traces the state’s housing deficit back to nearly two decades of economic, demographic, and market pressures. (see: https://www.nhmunicipal.org/housing-policy-and-local-governance)
New Hampshire’s housing shortage is a multifaceted crisis driven by a decade-plus of under-building following the Great Recession, which has been further strained in recent years by inflation and high interest rates. While increasing housing stock is vital, state policy has recently shifted away from successful state-local partnerships toward universal zoning mandates. However, land use rules alone did not create this shortage, and preempting local authority cannot solve it. Meaningful progress requires addressing the true drivers of costs such as financing, construction materials, labor availability, and infrastructure capacity.
The NHMA paper, released in January, about a week before the BEA report, argues for a renewed partnership between state and local governments—one that blends infrastructure investment, targeted incentives, and flexible, locally tailored tools. The BEA report offers evidence that such partnerships work: the 28 municipalities designated as Housing Champions accounted for 45% of all housing units approved in 2024. Created in 2023 with a $5 million appropriation, the Housing Champions program provides grants to communities willing to take proactive steps to expand affordable housing. It is voluntary, collaborative, and—judging by the numbers—effective.
Unfortunately, the House voted in February to pass HB 1196, which repeals the program entirely. As of this writing, the bill remains with the Senate; the Governor has publicly opposed the repeal.
Regardless of the ultimate fate of Housing Champions, it’s becoming clear to more and more people that New Hampshire’s housing shortage is the product of intertwined forces, not a single villain. Reducing the issue to “local zoning” not only misrepresents the problem but also alienates the very communities the state needs as partners. It ignores real infrastructure limitations and shifts costs onto local property taxpayers when state support evaporates.
As lawmakers weigh the remaining 2026 bills, there appears to be greater awareness of these complexities than there was a year ago. Visit NHMA’s online bill tracker for the status of this year’s planning, zoning and land use bills: Fast Democracy Bill Tracker