When it comes to ideas on how to boost new housing in New Hampshire, sewer-and-water improvements aren’t at the top of most people’s housing priority lists.

But maybe they should be – or at least higher up on those lists.

A recent report from the New Hampshire Zoning Atlas, in partnership with researchers at Saint Anselm College and other organizations, found that only 12 percent of the buildable area of New Hampshire has access to municipal water and/or sewer lines, a surprisingly small amount of land that limits where and how much higher-density, affordable housing can be built across the state.

Indeed, only 11.6 percent of the state has access to community water lines, 6.2 percent to sewer systems and 5.6 percent to both water and sewer infrastructures.

“It’s very important,” Matt Mayberry, chief executive of the New Hampshire Home Builders Association, said of developers’ need for water-and-sewer hookups in order to get many housing projects financially off the ground. “To have municipal water and sewer is key. With them, you can build more [residential units] on smaller lots. You have more opportunities to build new housing.”

But the trick is how to make sewer-and-water infrastructures more available for new housing projects.

Pricey Infrastructure Creates Problem

As Mayberry notes, building, maintaining and expanding sewer-and-water infrastructures can often cost tens of millions of dollars, price tags that most communities can’t easily afford without major tax increases.

Then there’s the attitude of individual towns and cities across the state.

Some communities may genuinely want more housing – and ideally want to hook new units up to existing sewer and water lines. But they balk doing so because their systems have already reached capacity or need major upgrades in order to take on additional users.

Of course, there are NIMBY forces that are more than glad to thwart new housing initiatives because of those very same capacity and cost concerns.

Despite the obstacles to building new housing via existing or expanded sewer and water lines, Elissa Magolin, director of Saint Anselm’s Initiative for Housing Policy and Practice, said the recent New Hampshire Zoning Atlas report has drawn much needed attention to the role of water and sewer infrastructures to new housing initiatives.

“The findings are starting to create a new conversation about what can and can’t be done,” she said. “It’s a complex issue that needs to be addressed.”

Nick Taylor, executive director of Housing Action New Hampshire, a housing advocacy group, said addressing sewer and water issues – as well as septic system issues in rural areas – is indeed key to building more badly needed housing in the state.

“It’s almost impossible to reach our housing goals without higher density [housing] attached to sewer and water,” he said. “It comes down to how much water is in an area and how you can treat wastewater. It’s about science. It’s about expanding infrastructure where it makes sense.”

Service Can Be Make-or-Break for Projects

To Mike Guitard, owner of Guitard Homes LLC, it’s also about dollars and cents.

The Jaffrey-based housing developer notes that it can often cost from $20,000 to $25,000 to dig wells for a new home on a lot without access to municipal water and sewer lines.

And then it can cost an additional $12,000 to $30,000 to install individual septic systems for that future individual home.

“So, on some projects, you’re starting off with $50,000 in expenses” tied to wells and septic systems, he said. “It gets very expensive. Each project is different. You can’t guess what it’s going to cost until you start work.”

But with access to existing sewer and water lines, those costs are largely eliminated, allowing developers to build less expensive homes.

The sewer-and-water savings are even greater if developers are allowed to build multiple housing units on individual lots with access to municipal water and sewer services, he said.

“It’s more efficient,” Guitard said, referring to building multiple units on smaller lot sizes. “It saves money.”

Workarounds When Towns Lack Service

But one obvious problem is that not all towns or neighborhoods have municipal water and sewer lines.

And many municipalities that do have water and sewer infrastructures have zoning laws that prohibit higher-density developments on lots.

There are ways to get around lack of access to municipal water-and-sewer infrastructures, such as building “shared wells” and “community septic systems” that spread costs around over two or more households.

Such systems are common in rural areas and in suburban-like “cluster subdivisions,” where access to municipal water and sewer service is non-existent.

But the same problem remains: costs. Shared well and septic systems are expensive.

Calls for State Aid Hit Obstacles

Can the state help out with the high costs of building or expanding water-and-sewer infrastructures – as well as building shared well and septic systems?

Theoretically, yes.

“I think it’s right for the state to leverage its finances to help communities out,” said Housing Action New Hampshire’s Taylor. “State help is needed.”

But the recent debate over the state’s “Housing Champions” law laid bare the reluctance of many lawmakers in Concord to fund programs designed to boost new housing.

Passed in 2023, the Housing Champions program issues state grants to communities that pass pro-housing zoning laws, such as allowing higher-density housing.

In turn, towns and cities can spend state funds on projects that boost housing construction, such as water-and-sewer infrastructure improvements.

Last fiscal year, the state appropriated $5 million to the Housing Champions program, but lawmakers cut that amount to zero in the current budget.

Still, House Republicans, saying that program was biased toward some communities and that the state needed to trim spending wherever it can, moved earlier this year to repeal the Housing Champions law entirely.

So far, the repeal effort has stalled in the Senate.

But the message is clear: don’t expect the state to appropriate additional big bucks to support water-and-sewer improvements – or at least not in the near future.