Mayor Durkan unveils biggest low-income housing increase in Seattle history
Dec 17, 2018, 2:02 PM | Updated: 2:51 pm
Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan announced Monday an investment of over $75 million to build and preserve more than 1,400 affordable homes across the city.
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Mayor Durkan’s plan represents the largest number of affordable homes ever created inside of a single year in Seattle.
“Affordability is really one of the most moral challenges of our time,” said Durkan in a press conference announcing the investment. “Too many people are getting pushed out of Seattle, and can’t afford to live here.”
In total, the city is targeting approximately 4,000 new affordable homes by 2022. Durkan’s proposed investment for 2019 will support the construction of ten new buildings housing 1,197 apartments. It will also preserve nine existing buildings housing 238 apartments.
The funds will come from Seattle’s Office of Housing, promising in a press release to “provide affordable homes through a broad range of housing types to meet the unique needs of low-income residents.”
A number of the new buildings will have community spaces on the ground floor to “benefit residents of the building, as well as the surrounding community.”
There will be an especial focus on housing and resources for the elderly, with 85 apartments set aside for seniors.
This initial $75 million investment will also support an additional $300 million in investments for affordable housing from public and private sources.
“We have to move the needle on affordability, and have to make decisions not just for today, but for the future generations of Seattle,” said Mayor Durkan.
In November, the city broke ground on 102 new affordable units in Seattle’s Little Saigon neighborhood.
For that project, the focus was on treating it as a “housing first” initiative, positing that recovery for the homeless can’t occur without first helping them establish a “safe, stable place to live.” To that end, the building in Little Saigon will offer on-site medical care, hospice care, counseling for veterans, and financial management when it’s finished.
The city also opened a new affordable housing complex in the former home of Fire Station 39 in Seattle’s Lake City neighborhood back in October. The complex includes 69 units, a four-classroom preschool, gardens, a rooftop deck, and a solar array.
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