On July 27, a Union city commissioner walked out of her own meeting. Kimberly Tuyn recused herself before the vote on Ordinance 2026-10, citing an unresolved personal complaint involving the builder at her own house. She left the room, the remaining four commissioners debated, and by the time she came back in, they had approved 135 new homes off Hathaway Road near Old Union Road and quietly dropped a condition that would have capped rental units in the development at 10 percent.
If you're comparing new construction in Union right now, that second detail matters more than the first. A builder's name and a unit count tell you what's being built. A rental cap, or the absence of one, tells you what kind of neighborhood you're actually buying into ten years from now. And in this case, the cap that was on the table disappeared during the same meeting that approved the project.
The Vote Nobody Watched Was About Renters, Not Rooftops
The project is called Union Acres, a joint proposal from Fort Mitchell-based Drees Homes and Arlinghaus Builders for 29 townhomes and 106 condominiums, all built as for-sale units with the HOA responsible for exterior maintenance. The Boone County Planning Commission recommended approval back in May. The Union City Commission spent June and July working through conditions: who plows snow, who repairs the fence along the western property line, who builds the walking path shown on the site plan.
The condition that drew real debate was different. An earlier draft would have limited non-owner-occupied homes, meaning rentals, to no more than 10 percent of the development. During the July 27 special meeting, commissioners removed it, after what the record describes as disagreement over property rights and how such a cap would even be enforced. The rest of the ordinance passed 3-1, with Mayor Larry Solomon and Commissioners John Mefford and George Eldridge voting yes and Commissioner Doug Bine voting no. You can read the full ordinance text on the City of Union's site.
Nothing about that removal will show up in a listing description. It won't appear in the HOA's marketing copy. It shows up only if you go looking for the zoning history, which is exactly why most buyers never see it.
Density Was the Part Everyone Expected to Fight Over
Density is usually where these fights happen, and Union Acres had one built in. The Boone County Comprehensive Plan classifies that stretch of Hathaway Road as high suburban density residential, allowing up to 8 units per acre. Drees requested 6, and the commission held them to it, adding a condition capping the project at six dwelling units per acre for the roughly 22-acre site.
That restraint looks different next to Drees' other Union proposal from earlier this year. In March, the same builder pitched 377 units, 247 single-family homes and 130 townhomes, on 185 acres along US-42 between Rice Pike and Bleu Yacht Lane. The planned density there was about 2.05 units per acre, less than half of what Union Acres ended up at. It didn't matter. Neighbors near the Twin Lakes subdivision showed up to oppose it over traffic and crowding at New Haven Elementary, and one resident, Charlene Scalia, put it bluntly at the planning commission meeting:
"Everything decays and everything goes down."
The developer withdrew the proposal. Here's the comparison worth sitting with:
| Development | Location | Units | Acres | Density (units/acre) | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Union Acres | Hathaway Rd near Old Union Rd | 135 (29 townhomes, 106 condos) | 22.185 | ~6.1 | Approved July 27, 2026 |
| US-42 proposal | West side US-42, Rice Pike to Bleu Yacht Ln | 377 (247 single-family, 130 townhomes) | 185 | ~2.05 | Withdrawn after resident opposition |
| Traemore | Frogtown Rd | 170+ homes | 87 | ~2.0 | Built, existing Drees community |
A higher-density project sailed through with barely any public comment, while a lower-density one collapsed under it. The variable that actually decided each outcome wasn't the units-per-acre math. It was whether a visible group of existing residents showed up and whether the site touched a road or school already at capacity. If you're weighing whether a new Union subdivision will face future pushback, that's the pattern to watch, not the density figure printed on the site plan.
Why the Cap Mattered Enough to Fight Over
Rental caps exist because HOAs and cities use them as a rough proxy for long-term owner-occupancy, which lenders and appraisers care about when a mortgage on a neighboring unit gets underwritten. A development with no ceiling on non-owner-occupied units can still end up mostly owner-occupied in practice. It can also drift the other direction if enough original buyers sell to investors over time, and there's no zoning mechanism left to slow it down.
That's the practical stakes of what happened on July 27. Union Acres will have a homeowners association, a density limit, a walking path, and a snow removal agreement written into the zoning approval. It will not have a rental ceiling written in. Whether that ends up mattering depends entirely on who buys in the first wave and what they do with the units later, which is not something a zoning ordinance can predict.
The Regional Math Behind Why This Keeps Happening
None of this is happening in isolation. A regional housing study cited in March 2026 reporting found that Northern Kentucky needs roughly 3,000 more housing units for households earning between $15 and $25 an hour, with monthly housing costs in the $500 to $1,500 range. That's the workforce housing gap, and attached product like townhomes and condos is one of the more direct ways builders can respond to it without buying up acreage for single-family lots.
Drees' own development manager, Matt Mains, framed the US-42 proposal earlier this year as an attempt to balance growth with land preservation, telling the planning commission the project's density was relatively low compared to what the comprehensive plan allowed. Union Acres follows the same logic in a different form: smaller footprint, higher density, for-sale product aimed at empty nesters and young professionals rather than families needing four bedrooms and a yard. Expect more of these proposals in Union over the next few years, not fewer, and expect the rental-cap question to come up again each time.
What This Means If You're Comparing New Construction in Union
If you're cross-shopping new construction here against established neighborhoods like Hampshire or Lassing Green, or against other Drees communities like Traemore, the sales brochure won't tell you which ones have a rental ceiling baked into their governing documents and which don't. That information lives in three places: the zoning ordinance itself, the recorded declaration of covenants for the HOA, and sometimes the plat notes filed with Boone County. None of it is hard to find once you know to ask for it, but almost nobody asks before they're already under contract.
This is the kind of detail that's easy to miss when you're comparing Union to other Northern Kentucky suburbs purely on price per square foot or school district. Two developments can look identical on paper and carry completely different long-term occupancy protections.
FAQ
Does removing the rental cap mean Union Acres will become mostly rentals? No. It means there's no zoning-level ceiling preventing it if market conditions push that direction later. Most of the units will likely be owner-occupied at first, since they're being sold, not built as rental product from day one.
How do I find out if a new-construction HOA in Union has a rental cap before I make an offer? Ask for the recorded declaration of covenants and the zoning ordinance for the parcel, not just the HOA's marketing summary. Both are public record through Boone County and the City of Union.
Are Drees' other Union communities, like Traemore or Hampshire, affected by this decision? No. Each development's covenants and zoning conditions are set individually at approval. This ordinance applies only to the Union Acres parcel on Hathaway Road.
Why did a commissioner recuse herself from the vote? Kimberly Tuyn cited an unresolved personal complaint involving the builder at her own residence and stepped out during the reading and vote on the ordinance, returning once it concluded.
If you're weighing a new-construction purchase in Union against resale options elsewhere in Northern Kentucky, this is exactly the kind of detail worth walking through before you write an offer. Wendy Goldfinger can pull the zoning history and HOA documents on any Union development you're considering and help you read past the sales brochure. Schedule a consultation to talk through what a specific property's paperwork actually says.
