How to Tackle Lack of Regional Affordable Housing? King County Calls In Experts

by Carolyn Bick

It's no secret Washington State has a critical shortage of affordable housing — and King County is no exception.

As of 2021, 76% of households in King County spent more than 30% of their total income on housing, rendering them cost-burdened and struggling to afford basic necessities. The County discovered in its 2023 housing needs assessment that it needs to build at least 5,412 affordable housing units to meet the identified need.

In an ongoing effort to address the county's lack of affordable housing — housing that does not eat more than 30% of a household's income — the King County Council's Local Services and Land Use Committee on July 17 invited a panel of regional housing experts to inform its inclusionary affordable housing efforts as part of a once-in-a-decade update to the County's Comprehensive Plan.

The panel included two development company executives, one property management company founder, two planning directors from different King County cities, and one housing-focused nonprofit representative, all of whom had different affordable housing program experience. Each pointed to the permitting process, costs of development, and current density limits as barriers to affordable housing.

Both Barbara Rodgers, vice president of Conner Homes, and Heidi Turner, chief of intangible assets at Blanton Turner, pinned the difficulties in affordable housing construction to the length of the permitting process.

The recently passed State Senate Bill 5290 shortens the time for permitting to nine weeks, a third of the original 27 weeks — a time frame change District 3 King County Councilmember and committee chair Sarah Perry characterized as "nothing short of a metamorphosis" that the County was working "very hard" to meet.

In the course of her remarks to the committee, Turner said large amounts of construction are in part fueled by low interest rates, especially when it comes to multifamily housing. She indirectly correlated the multiple interest rate hikes of 2022 as proof: While developers have so far completed only 2,200 units this year, 2022 saw about 10,000 units completed by year's end. She said rising costs of production cause developers to pause or cancel projects, all against a backdrop of lack of "workforce" housing and a rising homelessness rate.

Turner said Blanton Turner is focusing on creating workforce housing targeted for households who make certain percentages of area median income (AMI) levels, specifically focusing on development for people making 50% to 80% of AMI. For instance, in White Center, the company is creating units that are 50% AMI.

Turner said waiving development fees and offering tax exemptions were good incentives for developers, but creating more housing that developers could rent or sell at higher prices was the ticket.

"Lower AMI levels make it too difficult for most developments to get completed," she said. She suggested profits from such developments aren't cost-effective for developers, unless those units can be cost-balanced with apartments that can be rented for a higher price, including 80% AMI.

Whole Water Systems President Morgan Brown said one of the biggest issues facing Vashon Island is the hurdle that current height zoning (two stories) presents to multifamily housing. (District 8 King County Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda said this issue applied to the entire county.) He also said access to the island was another challenge, since, being an island, it's harder to get to and from. Like Rodgers, Brown also pointed to the permitting process as a barrier to affordable and inclusionary housing.

Patience Malaba, executive director of the Housing Development Consortium (HDC), appeared to put a more positive spin on things, pointing out that even though the county is in the midst of a deepening housing crisis, this year's Department of Commerce report revealed that the County holds 42% of the total 200,000 affordable housing units built over the last several years (she did not specify how many years, and the Emerald could not immediately locate the information).

However, she said, the state would need an additional 1 million homes, with 209,000 of those "right here in King County — and, to me, underscores the urgency of the work that we're doing."

"We do tend to focus on lower income ranges, because we know that's where we have a gap, and that's important. You've got to make sure that is in line with the economic analysis for the market in unincorporated King County," Malaba later told the committee. She suggested that if the County doesn't allow developers to build units they can rent for as much as possible, even when considering various AMI limits, the County will miss out on enticing developers who could build affordable housing.

Malaba also pushed for minimum parking requirements "to be eliminated altogether, particularly in areas where there is transit, or bus rapid-transit, nearby." She also raised whether permitting fees could be waived altogether to reduce cost of production, and said that even though there was pushback on the 5-over-1-style multifamily residences on places such as Vashon Island, such buildings are "typically the affordable housing product." (A 5-over-1 multifamily residence, also known as a "one plus five" or a podium building, holds five stories of residences over one concrete podium.)

Malaba told the committee there was another way to incentivize developers to build affordable homes: If developers opt to pay into a city's affordable housing fund instead of building affordable housing (known as an in-lieu fee), the County could tack on an extra 10% to that fee, in essence creating a tax that would yield higher revenue for a given city's housing fund, she said.

Adam Weinstein, director of planning and building for the City of Kirkland, told the Council that the City would appreciate more even zoning laws, so the city felt less like a patchwork of development, with different kinds of units scattered throughout.

He also said "apodments" are conceivable options for 80% AMI households, as demonstrated by people living in the available apodments in Seattle.

Such living spaces appear to be studios styled like college dorms, with in-room bathrooms. Apodment square footage ranges from 115 square feet to about 480 square feet (the latter square footage being an outlier, and currently listed as a "live/work space"). In the same building, a 170-square-foot apartment is listed as a "large studio."

None of the panelists directly addressed building housing for extremely low-income households, which would require building housing at just 30% of AMI — which, as pointed out during the meeting, was not attractive to developers looking to make a profit.

In King County, only "21 units are affordable and available for every 100 extremely low-income households," according to statistics provided by the county,

The State's Department of Commerce (DOC) 2023 end-of-year report states that of the nearly 1 million homes needed statewide by 2044, "a majority of those units [need to be] for extremely low-income households making 0-30% area median income."

As of 2021, most extremely low-income households in King County who report being cost-burdened are Black. The DOC report reflects the same situation statewide, showing that Black communities, Indigenous communities, and Communities of Color are the ones who disproportionately suffer from affordable housing scarcity.

📸 Featured Image: A building within Seola Gardens, a mixed-income community featuring rent-subsized and for-sale units in White Center managed by the King County Housing Authority, in July 2024. (Photo: Megan Christy)