Ten years ago, Seattle passed Council Ordinance 124608, which made changes to the land use code that choked off the creation of congregate housing in Seattle, ending a microhousing boom that had been bringing about 1000 units a year of un-subsidized affordable housing to the Seattle market. Almost immediately, policy makers realized they had made a serious mistake. Over the years I have met with many people in Seattle leadership who recognized that CO 124608 needed to be reversed but found themselves either unwilling to spend the political capital, or unable to assemble the political coalition that could muster the votes needed to fix it.
In this session, the Washington State legislature passed HB
1998, which requires cities and counties within urban growth boundaries to
allow co-living housing (aka rooming houses, SROs, congregate housing) in any
zone where general multi-family development is allowed (6 units or more). The
law was signed by the Governor on March 19th.
HB 1998 is a total game changer. The exclusionary policies enabled by CO 124608 are simply no longer allowed. Period. End of conversation. There will be no endless public hearings, no lawsuits, no epic struggle of NIMBYs vs YIMBYs. The state has given us until the end of 2025 to make the necessary changes to our land use code, at which point CO 124608 will simply become unenforceable. It is my hope that we will make these changes much sooner. This memo outlines the specific elements of the Seattle Municipal Code that need to change to comply with HB 1998. These changes are exempt from SEPA challenge, making the process relatively straightforward.
A decade ago, we passed a poorly considered law that made it hard for
developers to build low-cost basic housing. Thankfully, it is now more widely
understood in policy circles that the lack of low-cost basic housing is a major
contributor to our affordability challenges, and a primary cause of our
homelessness crisis. The state now requires us to fix the situation. I’m hoping
the Mayor and Council can get this done on a fast track so we can get to work
building the housing our city so desperately needs.
