Instead of just giving away reduced zoning restrictions and tax breaks, as many claim the city has been doing, officials are asking developers to trade affordable housing units for them. This is Murray’s “Grand Bargain,” a compromise between housing advocates and developers that was among the Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda (HALA) recommendations that were released in July. Developers would need to pay a linkage fee for every square foot of new commercial development that would fund new affordable housing, in exchange for increased building heights and sizes. Residential developers would need to allot 5 to 8 percent of a project’s units for affordable housing or pay a fee.
While it’s definitely a good start to building Murray’s target of 20,000 affordable units within 10 years, it won’t come quickly enough. Even O’Brien, who chairs the Select Committee on Housing Affordability that developed the legislation from the HALA recommendations, admitted in a press release, “We cannot build fast enough — especially not for those in need today.”
The Mayor’s Office told KUOW Public Radio that the recommendations would take two years for full implementation. In the meantime, the expected influx of new residents moving to Seattle for high-paying tech jobs would force the mass exodus of thousands more lower-income residents who would be pushed out of the city by ever-increasing rents and home prices.
And the residential developers have the option of just paying a fine, which would go toward the subsequent construction of affordable housing elsewhere, instead of building the units in their projects. If developers choose this alternative, then the city would still need to look for land somewhere else in our crowded city to build the affordable housing units — most likely through eminent domain.
And the legislation doesn’t include development impact fees to improve the city’s infrastructure to handle increased use. Instead, voters will need to approve the $930 million Move Seattle levy to address these needs.
King County’s 10-Year Plan to End Homeless, which lapsed this year, resulted in funding for 6,314 new units of permanent housing with supportive services for the homeless. If the county needed 10 years during a construction boom to build these units, it will likely take Seattle just as long, if not more, to reach its similar goal of affordable housing units in today’s real estate market.
Still, it makes one wonder if the legislation would discourage Seattle’s rapid development and move much of it to development-friendly Bellevue, so much so that home prices and rents may actually drop in Seattle.
Either way, this “grand bargain” doesn’t sound like the great deal it’s selling.