Bend city councilors decided Wednesday to support Ballot Measure 201. If approved by voters in November, it would allow cities to sell property tax-supported bonds to build affordable housing. The proposed constitutional amendment sounds good, but it also creates a problem the city should be aware of going forward.

The state constitution prevents cities and other municipalities from adding bond money to the financing available for affordable housing built and owned by private entities. The proposed ballot measure would amend Article XI, Section 9, to give municipalities the same power to add public funds to private projects that Oregon’s port districts now have. In that respect, it’s probably no big deal.

But it’s a bigger deal when looked at another way. Bond measures are paid off by virtually every adult in the city. Some pay directly when they receive property tax bills each October. Others pay monthly through rent on business space or housing or both. They do so because landlords, property owners all, must pay more in taxes every time a bond measure, no matter what it benefits, is approved.

Bend already is a relatively expensive place to live, and rising housing costs, even if they’re going up for the most humanitarian of reasons, serve to push some families into homelessness.

That said, some communities may find the new authority in Measure 201 a helpful tool.

A greater help, however, would be land use planning laws that gave cities the ability to expand as their citizens felt appropriate, without a 20-year fight to get the job only inadequately done. We call the job inadequate because this city finally was allowed to take in only about a quarter of the space city residents said was needed.

Those restrictions, limited space and lots of demand, drive housing prices up, as well. No wonder lower income families find it increasingly difficult to live here.