SEATTLE — Three new apartment buildings in Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood will be used to house adults and youth experiencing homelessness starting this fall.
Mayor Jenny Durkan announced the $50 million investment for low-income housing Monday.
Seattle contributed $25 million from its American Rescue Plan money for the housing, which is being matched by funding from the Washington State Department of Commerce's new Rapid Capital Housing Acquisition program.
The three buildings will provide 165 units to house people experiencing homelessness. The building names and locations are: Boylston, located at 420 Boylston Avenue E.; Harvard, located at 225 Harvard Avenue E.; and 10th Avenue, located at 506 10th Avenue E.
"These buildings are in the transit rich Capitol Hill area with easy access to jobs and services," Durkan said.
The Boylston and Harvard buildings will be owned and operated by the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI), and will serve adults experiencing homelessness or those at extreme risk of homelessness.
The third building, 10th Avenue, will be owned by LIHI and operated by YouthCare, and serve young adults experiencing homelessness.
City officials said the buildings were meant to be market rate studio apartments, but because of the real estate downturn the city bought them for the purpose of low-income housing instead.
“Our homelessness crisis has always been a housing crisis. The City of Seattle continues to make bold investments to address our homelessness crisis as quickly as possible. With this latest investment, we are building on a completely new approach that has the potential to become a national model for rapidly creating affordable housing,” Durkan said.
Durkan also said that over the next year, more than 1,300 homes will come online to support people experiencing homelessness or at risk of being without housing.
On Monday, Durkan also announced that Seattle joined the "House America" initiative led by U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Marcia Fudge, who serves as chair of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH).
House America is a national partnership in which HUD and USICH invite mayors, county leaders, Tribal nation leaders and governors to use the investments provided through the American Rescue Plan to address the crisis of homelessness.