2/9/2023
####################################
RangeMedia
The Spokesman-Review
KXLY
The Center Square
####################################
RangeMedia
Contributor
(Photo illustration by Valerie Osier)
PART 1: After a decade of punting, the legislature (finally!) seems to be taking the housing crisis seriously
By Anthony Gill, Spokane Rising
Another year, another legislative session. And for the first time in a long while, it seems like our state legislature is treating the housing crisis with the seriousness that it demands, with dozens of housing bills under consideration this session.
Last year, Spokane raised the bar in Washington for zoning standards that promote affordable and accessible housing. The city legalized construction of fourplexes on every residential lot, in an effort to bring more housing to the city, reduce sprawl, and create more living options for residents. Now, the state is looking at expanding many of Spokane’s standards to cities statewide — meaning Spokane Valley and other neighboring cities could soon have similar zoning standards for housing as Spokane.
But the state isn’t stopping at zoning changes. The legislature is also looking at ways to cut red tape that snarls new housing development and protections for renters to keep people housed.
In this two-part series, we’re tackling the most influential housing bills currently under consideration in Olympia.
Part 1: We’ll look at proposed bills that make it easier to build housing, generally by reducing barriers to construction of new housing, but also by directly funding construction of new affordable housing. Many of them have strong support from a broad cross-section of advocates, and could pass this session.
Part 2: We’ll examine bills seeking to improve conditions for renters, generally by increasing tenant protections and instituting new rules on when landlords can raise rent on their tenants — and what rights tenants have when they do.
Building more housing
According to Gov. Jay Inslee’s office, from 2000 to 2015, Washington State built 225,000 fewer units than we would have had to build to fully meet current demand. In Spokane County, we underbuilt during the 2010s by more than 32,000 units.
It’s no surprise, then, that dozens of bills under consideration attempt to make it easier to build new market-rate and affordable housing. Importantly, focusing on the lower end of the market alone is not an efficient or realistic way to address this crisis, because new rental housing generally gets less expensive over time as it ages.If we are to meet the scale of the challenge, we need to build both market-rate housing and dedicated affordable housing.
1. Legalize missing-middle housing
Spokane passed an emergency ordinance last year legalizing fourplexes citywide, but almost every other city in the state — including Airway Heights and Spokane Valley, and even Seattle and Everett — still bans duplexes and triplexes from the majority of neighborhoods. The big push this year is for HB 1110, which would legalize fourplexes on almost any residentially-zoned property in the state, with an option for an additional two units if those two units are affordable to people making less than 80% of the area’s median income. It would also allow six market-rate units per property near transit.
All indications are that HB 1110 has good chances — as of right now, it has 28 co-sponsors, including both of Spokane’s representatives, Marcus Riccelli and Timm Ormsby. The Housing Committee passed it on February 7, but in modified form which allows some cities with fewer than 75,000 people to legalize duplexes instead of fourplexes. The original version could still return in a future version of the bill.
Notably, the bill has some bipartisan appeal –– Rep. Andrew Barkis (R-Pierce County) recently explained his rationale for supporting the bill in The Urbanist, striking a similar tone to that of Spokane’s two conservative council members, who voted for Spokane’s missing middle package last year.
Still, there is substantial opposition to HB 1110, mostly from cities themselves, which feel that the bill undermines “local control” of planning and development issues. Their opposition appears to have –– at least for now –– watered down the bold original vision for the bill.
Other bills in this vein include:
HB 1337 requires cities to allow accessory dwelling units (ADUs) and reduces restrictions on their dimensions and size. These small units are a great option for multigenerational living, which is why they’re sometimes called “granny flats.” This bill has passed the House Committee on Housing and awaits action from the Rules Committee to bring it to the floor.
SB 5466 increases allowable development around transit, including Spokane’s new Central City Line and the planned North Division bus line. Spokane’s state senator, Andy Billig is a co-sponsor and this bill has strong support. It passed the Senate Committee on Local Government, Land Use, & Tribal Affairs on February 7 and now moves to the Transportation Committee.
HB 1245 / SB 5364 require most cities to allow property owners to split their lots into lots as small as 1,500 square feet. This would, in theory, allow for easier development of cottage dwellings and townhomes or rowhomes. A version of this bill has passed the Senate Committee on Local Government, Land Use & Tribal Affairs and awaits action to bring it to the floor. A version has also passed the House Committee on Housing.
2. Cutting red tape on new housing
The reality is that even in cities that “legalize” duplexes and triplexes, they won’t actually be built unless cities tackle the far more onerous standards that fall within their land use and building codes. These complex rules govern everything from how far a building needs to be set back from a street to how many staircases and how much parking it must include.
Spokane’s fourplex law addressed many of these rules, but HB 1167 takes these reforms statewide. Under this bill, most cities will be required to:
Use similar zoning, development, parking, design review, and other standards for multiplexes to those used for single-family homes.
Not mandate setbacks from the property line if a housing development is located within a quarter mile of frequent transit, a school or a park
Not require more than a single stairway in a residential building of six or fewer stories, as long as the city has a municipal water supply and a professional fire department.
Additionally, development near transit, schools or parks would be exempt from the State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA), which means that these types of housing could move forward without costly and time-consuming environmental review. Environmental protections are important, but this process is often subject to abuse and appeal by NIMBY-minded neighbors.
Finally, the State Building Council would be required to recommend changes to the state’s building code to ensure multiplex housing is subject to the International Residential Code (IRC), rather than the more onerous International Building Code(IBC). This gets very wonky, but would essentially subject so-called “missing middle” housing to the same building codes as single-family homes, instead of to the same standards as large office towers.
Right now HB 1167 is waiting for actionin the House Committee on Appropriations. Once passed, it would need action at the Rules Committee to bring it to the House floor.
Despite an uphill lift ahead (as for most of the bills listed here), HB 1167 has strong support from a broad range of activists, and stands a decent chance if it makes it to the House floor. It will face a slightly higher bar in the Senate, where a handful of Democrats are more openly critical of these types of changes.
Other notable bills in this category include:
HB 1042 allows expansions onto existing apartment buildings without additional parking requirements, design standards, or transportation review. A version of this bill has passed the House Committee on Housing and it has been placed on “second reading” by the Rules Committee.
SB 5491, a narrow bill which would allow single-stair buildings. These are common in Europe but virtually unheard-of in the United States, despite their increased livability, cross-ventilation, and lower construction cost. Right now, this bill awaits action in the Senate Committee on Local Government, Land Use & Tribal Affairs.
3. Make it easier to build condos
As single-family home prices continue to rise, condos are an affordable, low-maintenance option — particularly for young people without kids and for older adults. But tough liability laws make it much more expensive for developers to build condos than apartments, so most new multifamily housing ends up on the rental market instead of giving young people an opportunity to build equity.
HB 1298 / SB 5258 would begin to address these barriers by changing the standards for construction defect claims and construction warranties on condos — with a particular emphasis on buildings with 12 or fewer units. It’s an extremely wonky issue, but developers, council members and planners I’ve spoken with suggest it could make a significant difference, tipping the scales just a bit closer for builders constructing condo units for purchase instead of rental apartments.
In the Senate, this bill is scheduled for possible action in the Committee on Law & Justice on February 9. In the House, this bill needs more support. It hasn’t had a hearing in the Civil Rights & Judiciary Committee yet.
4. Eliminate parking requirements
Oregon and California led the way on eliminating parking requirements near transit. And it’s no wonder why: in a housing crisis, housing people is far more important than housing cars. And we can house a lot of people in the space we devote to cars. Two parking spaces take up the same amount of space as a small, efficiently built two-bedroom apartment.
Now, it’s Washington’s turn to abolish parking requirements.
HB 1351 / SB 5356 would ban cities from requiring parking for new residential or commercial development within a quarter-mile of frequent transit (bus service that comes every fifteen minutes or fewer during the workday). Crucially this means that not only would new housing not be required to include parking, but new commercial developments would also not require parking. Spokane has a headstart on eliminating parking requirements in neighborhood retail zones (this was aimed at allowing more shops like Made With Love and Rockwood Bakery), but this would extend the allowance to much more of the city.
Right now, the bill is scheduled for action in the House Committee on Local Government on February 8 and the Senate Committee on Local Government, Land Use & Tribal Affairs on February 9. It has stronger support than any parking bill has had before, but already a compromise has led to the distance from transit being reduced from ½-mile to ¼-mile. More public support is needed to get this bill over the finish line.
5. Directly build affordable housing
Finally, Gov. Inslee has requested that the legislature issue up to $4 billion in bonds to finance new projects and programs addressing homelessness and housing insecurity. The bond authorization would go to the voters for approval as early as November 2023. If passed, the state would use the funds to help nonprofit and for-profit developers, public housing authorities and others build housing for low-income households making 50-80% of the area median income.
According to the governor’s proposal, this would be enough funding to build approximately 5,300 new units between 2023-2025 and 19,000 from 2026-2031. Theoretically, this would be enough housing for every one of the 13,000 people statewide living unsheltered as of the 2022 statewide Point in Time Count.
The governor’s proposal is encapsulated in SB 5202 / HB 1149. In the Senate, the bill has passed the Committee on Housing and has been referred to the Ways & Means Committee. In the House, the bill received a hearing on January 12 in the Committee on the Capital Budget, but is waiting for action.
All in all, this session is shaping up to be a banner year for housing advocates — if the legislature delivers. And, that remains a big if.
In my next article, I’ll analyze the bills under consideration which would improve conditions for existing renters through rent control, advance notification for rent increases and other important reforms similar to (and in some cases stronger than) those under consideration at the Spokane City Council.
How to get involved
If you’d like to get involved, check out Homes for WA, a campaign of Futurewise and Sightline Institute organizing statewide advocates in support of many of the bills mentioned above, as well as other changes to state housing and planning law.
You can also offer direct public comment on each Bill Information page linked above, or sign in “pro” (or "con") in advance of a committee public hearing.
####################################
The Spokesman-Review
Note left in fence chastises city
Portland’s famed Belmont Goats were temporarily set free early Tuesday morning in what appeared to be an act of protest against a planned sweep of a nearby homeless encampment.
Robin Casey, co-owner of the Belmont Goats, said she discovered Tuesday morning that the goats’ fence had been cut and found a note rolled up inside the fence.
“In what reality is the comfort of five goats valued over the shelter of more than fifteen people,” said the letter, signed by “some anarchists. So, it’s time for the Belmont Goats to enjoy a little walk in the park.”
Casey said all the escaped goats have been retrieved and appear to be healthy.
The nonprofit-funded goats currently live in a fenced area near Peninsula Crossing Trail in North Portland. The land is owned by the Portland Housing Bureau. When the city announced a year ago plans to construct a tiny home village at that location at 6631 N. Syracuse St., they agreed to help relocate the goats just south of that spot.
The new site planned for the Belmont Goats is located where more than a dozen people currently are living unsheltered. The city has informed residents that it will conduct a sweep of the encampment.
“People don’t know where to go. People are desperate. Sweeps are a cruel, inhuman and murderous way for the city to push people around,” the letter said. “To kick the can down the road and avoid addressing the real issues, which are the astronomical rise in the cost of housing.”
The city has been providing outreach to the encampment residents for about six months, at least twice a month, said Cody Bowman, spokesperson for Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler. The residents were offered shelter beds, free rides to a shelter and storage for their belongings, among other services, he said.
The note left in the fence claimed that those living in the encampment were just told to call 211 for information about shelter resources. Over the past few years, many have reported that calling 211 often fails as a connection to shelter or other resources.
####################################
KXLY
By Mai Hoang / Crosscut.com, February 8, 2023
Over the past two decades, Walla Walla has become a destination for wine lovers who travel to the region to enjoy some of its more than 120 wineries, stay in the area’s boutique hotels, and dine and shop in a beautiful and bustling downtown.
While leaders of this small southeastern Washington city are happy to claim this economic success, being a booming wine region has resulted in other problems for its residents.
Friends and neighbors Patricia Divine Wilder and Di Gabriel have witnessed this growth, having lived in the area on and off for the past two decades.
But the retired women, who both live in a housing development a few miles east of the tasting rooms dotting Walla Walla’s downtown, have also seen another, more concerning, trend: drastically rising rents. Both women live on fixed incomes and often wonder where they’ll get the money for future increases.
“It’s a central issue that is of huge concern to us,” Divine Wilder said.
It’s also a concern for civic leaders – not just in Walla Walla but across Washington. The sharp rise in rent in the Walla Walla area, with a population of around 45,000, is just one of many examples across the state that renting a home has become increasingly difficult from Seattle to Spokane and in every small city and town in between.
While Seattle may have the highest rents statewide, the most drastic percentage increases over the past four to five years are in smaller cities and rural areas. And affordability is not an issue just for the poor but across different income levels: Even college-educated professionals are feeling the pinch of rapidly rising prices.
Median gross rent in Washington was nearly $1,500 in 2021, ranking it among the top five U.S. states, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Only Hawaii and California had considerably higher rents (along with Washington, D.C.), and Colorado and Massachusetts were a few dollars higher.
Rents have continued to accelerate consistently since then, said Tedd Kelleher, director of housing policy for the state Department of Commerce. His department is working closely with the Legislature and Gov. Jay Inslee, who is making housing affordability one of his signature issues this year.
Housing affordability has been a focus of the Legislature in recent years. In 2019, lawmakers directed the Washington Center for Real Estate Research, based at the University of Washington, to provide additional data to grasp the severity of the issue.
Several bills in the current session focus on affordability, including one aimed at limiting drastic rent increases.
Rents rising in Washington’s smaller communities
The Walla Walla Community Council, a nonprofit organization that works to engage the region’s residents on policy solutions to improve the area, researches various policy topics. In 2019, it decided to dive deeply into the region’s housing affordability issues, said Laura Prado, the council’s community research coordinator. The interest was so deep, and the topic so important, that the council recently expanded its planned research period and updated its original report.
One of the most notable findings in the council’s updated report, released last summer, was that the percentage of Walla Walla residents who were cost-burdened — spending 30% or more of their income on rental costs — was higher than in Seattle. That figure was 56% for Walla Walla renters, compared to 44% for Seattle renters.
Divine Wilder can speak to that first-hand.
As a young adult working as a waitress in Walla Walla during the 1970s, she could cover her portion of the rent — she lived with a roommate — after working a few shifts at her restaurant job.
She left Walla Walla for many years, moving around the country with her former husband and son. Divine Wilder, now single, returned to Walla Walla in the early 2000s with a bachelor’s degree from the University of Washington. Rent was still not a challenge; she easily paid $425 a month, just 17% of the income she earned as a technical writer for a local business.
Two decades later, she now pays $1,045 a month, or 53% of her income — which puts her among those considered “severely cost-burdened,” defined as spending at least 50% of one’s income on housing.
Seattle’s high rent gives the perception that it has more cost-burdened people. But while rents are lower in Walla Walla and other parts of the state, so are wages.
“It’s something that’s occurring throughout the state,” said Steven Bourassa, director of the Washington Center for Real Estate Research and chair of the Runstad Department of Real Estate at the University of Washington.
Wilder said she lives primarily on Social Security but has managed various side jobs, such as a part-time editing position, to help cover rent increases. She’s also received monetary gifts from family members to help her stay afloat.
“The rent is going up so quickly,” she said, noting that her rent has increased by 37.5% from the $760 a month she paid when she moved into her current rental in 2018.
Under current law, landlords can raise the rent to any amount; the only requirement is a 60-day notice of any increases. However, Senate Bill 5435, which had a public hearing recently, would cap annual rent increases to the rate of inflation or to 3 percent – whichever number is higher – with a maximum increase of 7 percent.
While the state Legislature passed a law making rent control illegal in 1981, housing advocates emphasize that the proposed legislation is “rent stabilization” – not “rent control,” in which rent is frozen to a specific price.
No community is immune
The Walla Walla region is the most extreme example of rapidly rising rent, but no area of Washington has been immune.
A survey of 18 Washington counties from the Washington Center for Real Estate Research at the University of Washington shows average rent increases for a one-bedroom apartment of between 10% and 53.3% from 2018 to 2021, when comparable data was available. Walla Walla County reported the highest increases.
But many other counties also saw double-digit-percentage rent increases. Rent in Benton and Franklin counties, home to the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and the cities of Richland, Kennewick and Pasco, increased by 34.25% between 2018 and 2021. The 110,000 residents of Cowlitz County are emptying more of their wallets too: Rents rose by 25.47%.
Meanwhile, the latest data from the center show that King County’s average rent as of the fourth quarter of last year was just above $2,000 a month, a year-over-year increase of 2.4%. In contrast, Walla Walla County’s average rent is half that— $990 per month — but its growth rate year over year was four times King County’s, at 9.7%.
Rent is now rising more slowly in Seattle because of the city’s massive construction of multifamily housing, said Bourassa. “The volume of construction has been huge. That’s helped temper the rent growth rates relative to other places, even places close to Seattle.”
The state Legislature tapped the Washington Center for Real Estate Research to provide additional data to give policymakers a better sense of the housing affordability issue. But data has its limits, Bourassa acknowledged. It often overlooks what housing advocates and policymakers call the “missing middle”: those who may not qualify for low-income subsidized housing but may still be cost-burdened by the high rent in their community.
Data about median rent rates “is a way to get a general idea of what’s going on in the market,” Bourassa said. “It’s not capturing everybody’s experience by any means.”
Indeed, there is a distinction between affordable and subsidized housing, said Prado of the Walla Walla Community Council. Subsidized housing generally is aimed at low-income residents, but even educated professionals can be cost-burdened and need more affordable housing.
For example, the Walla Walla Community Council’s updated report shows that a police officer was spending 28% of their income on housing, hovering around the 30% threshold for being cost-burdened. A teacher spending 27% of their income on housing was in the same situation.
“You don’t have to be low-income or even moderate-income to have a mismatch between your cost … for your home and your income,” Prado said. “It applies to all income levels.”
Rent is also rising in Washington’s more affordable communities, forcing residents to adjust.
Average rent in Yakima County was $903 a month as of the fourth quarter of 2022, well below the $1,799 statewide average and among the lowest, according to figures from the Washington Center for Real Estate Research. However, rent still rose by 4% year over year.
But some Yakima County residents are paying well above the county average for a larger apartment with better amenities or to live in a nicer neighborhood.
Michelle Barela owned a home for several years, but ended up renting again nine years ago after, as she said, “unexpectedly becoming a single parent.” She found a place in the Yakima area in proximity to a good school district, and has remained there since with her now-high-school-aged child.
She currently pays $1,100 a month for a three-bedroom, two-bathroom house. However, she has neighbors who spend hundreds of dollars more a month for a similar-sized rental.
“I know other people in my area that have top-of-the-line of everything, and their rent reflects that,” Barela said. “That’s not important to me. The school district was what was important.”
With a landlord who is easy to work with and rent at a manageable level, Barela hopes she can save enough eventually to buy.
“I don’t want to move into another rental situation,” she said. “I want my own home.”
Why rising rents matter for all
The conversation is shifting over who is impacted by a lack of “affordable housing.” In the past, it was mostly considered an issue for those with little to no income. But experts say not addressing this problem has a broader effect on the community.
A December 2021 report by a group of University of Idaho professors looked at the impact of rapidly rising rent in Coeur d’Alene. The Idaho city’s dozens of lakes — including the famed Lake Coeur d’Alene — and bounty of recreational opportunities have made it a popular tourist destination, including for those living in Spokane, just 30 miles away. These amenities have also made it attractive to new residents, driving up demand for housing.
The study found rapidly rising rents left at least 44% of Kootenai County households cost-burdened, paying at least 30% of their income to cover the $1,402 average rent in October 2021.
The study estimated that for even a studio apartment, a resident or household would have to make at least $21 an hour to afford average rent, well above Idaho’s minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. That is also above neighboring Washington’s much higher minimum wage, which was $13.69 an hour in 2021.
The most apparent impact on the community was difficulty securing workers. About 44% of executives and managers in Coeur d’Alene surveyed for the study indicated they could not fill positions due to the housing market and the resulting higher salaries required for those workers.
The lack of affordable housing stock also likely led to prospective businesses skipping the area, leading to fewer jobs.
This also is bad news for residents dependent on services, such as healthcare, because many workers in certain fields are being priced out, said Timothy P. Nadreau, a Washington State University economics professor who provided assistance for the study.
The study found that pricing out renters across different income levels would decrease the community's diversity and change it into a community for the rich, with restaurants and other services catering to that population.
Essential workers who can no longer afford to live in a community lacking affordable housing may have to commute, and some may opt to leave the area altogether.
“You get to this point that even the higher wage is not covering the travel expense and time [to commute],” Nadreau said.
How we got here
While rents have risen rapidly in just the past few years, the root of the problem dates back to the national housing bubble of the late 2000s, which led to what many know as the Great Recession, said Kelleher of the state Department of Commerce. While Washington experienced foreclosures and dropping home values, it did not have a glut of vacant homes like elsewhere in the U.S. because it had not experienced the level of overbuilding seen in other states.
“We never got the big vacancy rates that some [places had],” Kelleher said.
But Washington, like the rest of the U.S., did see a massive exodus of construction workers as the housing market crumbled. So when housing demand started to increase again in the 2010s, there were not enough workers to ramp up the construction of single-family homes and build the multifamily housing units needed to meet demand. That translated into high demand for fewer homes for sale and a low vacancy rate for rentals.
Everything changed when the pandemic hit in 2020. With COVID-19 forcing people to work remotely, many saw an opportunity to exit areas like Seattle and move to less-crowded — and presumably more affordable — places elsewhere in Washington. Those places also offered a multitude of areas to camp, hike, swim and ski, outdoor activities that many deemed safe during the pandemic.
“There was a demand shock,” Kelleher said. “… That took an already tight situation and pushed it further.”
Before the pandemic, migration from urban areas to smaller towns and more rural areas of Washington occurred on a much smaller scale. People were seeking less traffic, a better quality of life and, in some cases, responding to marketing campaigns from places like Spokane, the state’s second-largest city, which advertised itself as a nicer alternative to life in the Puget Sound area.
The pandemic accelerated that trend. Many small communities, and even cities like Spokane, Vancouver and Yakima, needed more housing for an influx of new residents.
Dave Bilsland, a renter in Spokane since 1996, said he questioned his city’s efforts to attract new residents as he saw housing options shrinking, not growing. “There’s not enough room for the people here,” he said.
Indeed, Spokane County’s vacancy rate was as low as 1.1% in the fall of 2021, according to the Washington Center for Real Estate Research.
Bilsland, who lives on a combination of Social Security and a small pension, managed to get subsidized housing as a veteran. But he knows others who have been on subsidized housing wait lists for years. A 2021 report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a national policy research firm in Washington, D.C., shows the wait for subsidized housing at some agencies can be as long as eight years. The report also indicates that out of the largest 50 housing agencies that provide Section 8 vouchers, only two had average wait list times of under a year.
The rent for Bilsland’s one-bedroom apartment increased from $525 a month in 2019 to $650 today. Other larger units in his building, north of Gonzaga University, also increased — from $625 a month to $800. The average monthly rent in Spokane for a one-bedroom apartment is $1,092 as of the fourth quarter of 2022, according to the Washington Center for Real Estate Research.
Bilsland said he’s well aware of others who struggle to get housing and end up homeless. Spokane garnered statewide attention recently because of Camp Hope, a tent encampment that housed upward of 600 residents this summer, making it the largest in the state. However, service providers' recent efforts to move residents to indoor shelters have reduced the number of people in the encampment to just over 120 as of last month.
Bilsland himself has been close to being homeless. Before securing subsidized housing, he had slept at friends’ homes and even spent one winter in the early 2000s in a shelter.
“This has been a problem in Spokane for years,” he said. “We’ve never had enough shelter space, and we don’t have enough houses.”
What’s the solution?
Indeed, housing advocates and policymakers believe the solution to addressing the state’s affordability issue is building more housing to buy and rent.
The state Department of Commerce estimates that the state will need an additional 1.05 million housing units by 2044. However, for state officials, it’s not just the number of homes that matters, but also making housing accessible to people across different income groups.
Just under half — 416,507 — of those housing units are needed for those who can afford 80% or higher of the area median income for each county. For Walla Walla County, that would mean one-bedroom units that cost $1,210 or less.
When households with higher incomes cannot buy a home due to the lack of supply, they compete in the rental market against people with lower incomes.
“You’ve got people living in lower-end units who can afford more but decide it’s not necessary,” said Kelleher of the state Department of Commerce.
Gov. Inslee’s plans for addressing housing affordability – a centerpiece of his legislative agenda this year – include proposals to increase the pace of construction of housing units. Those measures include streamlining regulations and providing construction grants to accelerate multifamily projects.
But the problem doesn’t end at construction, Kelleher said. A segment of residents — households earning 10% to 30% of the local median income — still won’t be able to afford whatever new units are built. Inslee’s budget plan would designate nearly $700 million to develop and preserve housing for low-income residents.
Commerce is also working with individual cities and towns to craft beneficial local policies, make housing action plans and change laws to increase housing supply.
One such strategy many communities have taken on is a zoning change to allow multifamily housing in single-family neighborhoods. While some Seattle neighborhoods are still fighting similar policy changes, the Walla Walla City Council voted unanimously in 2018 to allow multifamily housing in all residential housing zones. A proposal to require similar changes in all cities larger than a specific size is being considered in the Legislature this year.
Walla Walla officials got community support for the zoning change by illustrating how a mix of homes was already typical in the city, said Preston Frederickson, development services director for the City of Walla Walla.
For Frederickson, increasing housing density was something the city could control, as opposed to something like rent control, which is a state issue, in his opinion. Rent control as an approach to making housing more affordable has not been adopted anywhere in Washington. Still, it has been debated before the Seattle City Council, which often experiments with new policies before they are widely adopted across the state.
“Now we’re seeing new subdivisions that have a mixture of single-family [homes] and duplexes, mixing renters and homeowners,” he said. “It’s nice to see that diversity of people in these areas being developed. It’s not the ‘rental district’ or ‘Here’s the homeowners' district.’”
Because Walla Walla’s new zoning policy is just a few years old, whether these changes will help increase supply and moderate rents is still unknown.
The city is also considering a multifamily tax exemption for renovating a building where at least 25% of the units are deemed affordable.
Getting involved
While past policy discussions about housing have focused on homeownership, renters are getting involved in the political process, demanding new approaches to address affordability in their communities.
Bilsland has been active in various protests and marches demanding increased shelter space for homeless residents. He’s shown up at city housing forums to express his displeasure with a lack of housing, especially for low-income residents. He’s also supported alternatives, such as tiny homes. And he’s also active in the Spokane branch of the Tenants Union of Washington.
“We’re still pushing to get rights for tenants,” he said.
Divine Wilder is also politically active, recently speaking for the proposed stabilized rent bill at a hearing late last month before the Senate Housing Committee. She’s also part of Common Roots Housing Trust, which aims to build affordable homes in Walla Walla and the surrounding area for purchase in the next few years.
“I’m activist-minded; that’s part of my makeup,” she said. “When I see something that doesn’t seem fair, I often get involved.”
Meanwhile, she’s had to be mindful of prices when she shops for groceries and turn down lunches out with friends to ensure she has enough to pay her rent.
“I’ve told them when the weather is nice, we can brown-bag it. I can bring a sandwich to the park,” she said.
Divine Wilder is also helping her friend and neighbor, Di Gabriel, navigate rising rent. Unlike Divine Wilder, who has managed to weather increases through side gigs, Gabriel’s budget depends mainly on disability payments.
This past summer, Divine Wilder told Gabriel about a local nonprofit offering rent assistance. In September, Gabriel could get enough aid to pay rent through March.
Since she has rent covered for several months, she’s put some money in the bank in anticipation of paying rent when the assistance runs out. Still, she’s unsure how long her savings will last, especially after additional rent increases.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen after March,” she said.
She’s prepared to make changes. She’s applied and qualified for subsidized housing, although she’s on a waitlist and could be for several years. She’s thought about having a roommate, although her current place doesn’t allow it.
Still, Gabriel isn’t ready to leave her apartment, where she’s lived for years. She, Divine Wilder and other neighbors have formed a supportive community. She’s enjoyed doing crafts in her home and taking walks around her building with her dog.
“I’m cozy, and I’m happy,” she said. “It’s everything I want.”
Visit crosscut.com/donate to support nonprofit, freely distributed, local journalism.
####################################
The Center Square
Yakima, Washington
(The Center Square) – The Yakima City Council has authorized a contract with the Young Women's Christian Association of Yakima to provide $2 million of its Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery funds to construct a domestic violence shelter.
The Saint Elizabeth’s Nursing School building will be renovated with plans to have 45 emergency shelter rooms and house up to 117 people, according to the resolution. There would also be separate emergency shelter rooms for men and their children, who are unable to be sheltered at the Young Women’s Christian Association’s current facility.
The $2 million will be paid on a reimbursement basis, according to the resolution. If the shelter is not fully funded, the money will be returned to the city and be reallocated.
The domestic violence shelter project is estimated to cost between $15 million and $19 million, according to Cheri Kilty, executive director at the Young Women's Christian Association of Yakima. Kilty told The Center Square in an email that the association is “grateful to be partnering with the City of Yakima on this renovation of the old St. Elizabeth’s Nursing School building.”
The Young Women's Christian Association of Yakima has also applied for several other grants and will have a capital campaign later on in order to have the required funds for the shelter construction.
Yakima has the highest rate of domestic violence in the state of Washington alongside Spokane, according to Kilty. The Yakima Police Department responds to over 3,600 domestic violence calls on average each year.
The Young Women's Christian Association of Yakima has its hands full as a result. The association is serving 14,000 people a year experiencing domestic violence.
“For the last five years there are at least 400 plus families that when they call us in the heat of a crisis our shelter is full,” Kilty said. “So the need is great.”