Why Salt Lake City is exploring a change to its housing definition of 'family'

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah’s capital city currently allows any number of related people to live in a household, but city planners say other elements of its household size requirements may factor in the rising cost of housing that residents are facing.

That’s why city leaders are leaning toward rewriting the code by essentially reverting to the way it was written nearly a century ago. Members of the Salt Lake City Council called on the city’s planning and civil enforcement divisions to work toward crafting an ordinance that could allow any number of people living together in a single household unit.

“We already have a lot of places now where there’s probably a large number of people living in small places because they can’t afford anything else, so I think it’s already happening here across th