KING COUNTY, Wash. — The King County Council approved a motion Tuesday afternoon intending to free up $1 billion for the development of more low-income housing.
The motion passed 8-1. Councilmember Reagan Dunn was the lone dissenting vote.
The proposal, sponsored by Councilmember Girmay Zahilay, would utilize King County’s excess debt capacity to foot the bill. After securing the funding, the county would be directed to partner with housing agencies to develop units that are rent-restricted - in other words, affordable to working-class families.
The motion is part of King County’s longstanding plans geared toward generating more affordable housing for moderate, low, very low and extremely low-income households. Census data shows more than 124,000 low and moderate-income households in King County are cost burdened, meaning they spend more than 30% of their income on rent, with communities of color and renters disproportionately likely to be severely cost-burdened, meaning housing costs take up more than half of their paychecks.
Zahilay said this results in employees being forced to live further away from their workplaces, increasing commutes and having a ripple effect across our economy.
"That has societal level impacts when people are living father away from their jobs," Zahilay said during the council meeting. "They spend more time commuting, releasing more carbon into the air. We reduce productivity. We have families spending more time apart. We have lower quality services."
The motion represents the very beginnings of the process. Effectively, it directs the King County executive to establish a Regional Workforce Housing Initiative and also a plan to implement that initiative, keeping some specific things in mind.
For example, the council would direct the executive to make recommendations about which income levels could have access to the units, with a preference for mixed-income communities, a feasibility analysis relating to the costs of constructing new housing versus acquiring and remodeling existing buildings, and assessing scenarios where rent would remain “constant in perpetuity” for residents, other than to reflect rate changes on the loan the county would take out to fund construction and operating costs.
The motion requests that the plan be complete and ready to begin implementation in March of 2025.