Housing For All Action at City Hall – On Wednesday, Housing For All is organizing a letter delivery at the Seattle City Council’s 2pm Finance Committee meeting, where the Progressive Revenue Task Force will present its recommendation to the council. The letters will urge the Council to implement an employee hours tax to raise not just the $75 million per year the task force is recommending for affordable housing, but to also double its progressive revenue goal to close the housing gap. “Housing For All is urging the City to find at least $150 million per year in progressive revenue to create new housing, shelter and services–including through a tax on large businesses like Amazon. Join us!”
Hear TRU’s Katie Wilson speak at The Urbanist’s Meetup Today – The Urbanist is excited to host Katie Wilson, the General Secretary of the Seattle Transit Riders Union at our March meetup tonight at Elephant and Castle. Wilson and the Seattle TRU have been a driving force between some of the biggest initiatives in Seattle, including the Trump Proof Seattle effort that passed a city income tax, Housing For All’s campaign pushing big solutions to the housing affordability crisis, numerous transit funding packages, the free transit passes for high school students, and ORCA LIFT program providing reduced fares for low income riders. The meeting starts at 5:30pm Tuesday.
Attend Lid I-5 Event and Comment on Collaborative Designs – Lid I-5 is hosting an event Thursday to review the early work of Central Hill Triangle Collaborative’s seven design teams that paired professional designers and community members. The teams aim to imagine what the space above I-5 could look like when the freeway is lidded. The event if from 6 to 9pm at Optimism Brewing on March 15th.
Strategize how to repeal the state rent control ban with the Tenants Union – The Tenants Union of Washington is hosting a meeting on Thursday to talk about ways to protect renters’ rights. “We’re going to be discussing the wins from this years legislative session and planning how we build on that momentum to Repeal the Ban on Rent Regulation next year. All tenants and allies are welcome and invited!” Rep. Nicole Macri, who proposed a bill to repeal the ban earlier this year, has argued lifting the ban has ancillary benefits such as making it harder to sue municipalities for rent regulations or inclusionary zoning. Whether or not you support rent control, she has a good point there. The meeting is from 6:30 to 8pm Thursday at the Tenants Union’s office in Columbia City.
Attend Capitol Hill Renters Initiative MHA Workgroup Meeting Wednesday – The Capitol Hill Renters Initiative is meeting at 6pm Wednesday to discuss what tweaks it’d like to see in the “City-wide” Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) rezones building off the MHA comments the group submitted to the City and published with us here. The group has extended an invitation to anyone whether or not you’ve been involved before.
Attend Rainier Avenue presentation at Pedestrian Advisory Board meeting Wednesday – The Seattle Pedestrian Advisory Board will get the latest from Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) on its Rainier Avenue S redesign to accommodate RapidRide buses and people seeking to get around without cars. We toured the Rainier last fall to see the segment getting the redesign. SDOT seems set on eliminating Alternative 2, which includes protected bike lanes, at this stage. The meeting is at 6pm Wednesday at room L280 at Seattle City Hall.
Get your comments on on the MHA rezones: If you’ve spent any time reading The Urbanist you probably know the city is working on implementing mandatory housing affordability with rezones that increase density. We’ve written about it a lot and a summary of the final proposal can be found here. The City’s next MHA event will be an open house March 29 at Washington Hall and focus on District 3 and 7 maps. Get it on your calendar if you’re interested and share it with your friends.
Doug Trumm is publisher of The Urbanist. An Urbanist writer since 2015, he dreams of pedestrianizing streets, blanketing the city in bus lanes, and unleashing a mass timber building spree to end the affordable housing shortage and avert our coming climate catastrophe. He graduated from the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance at the University of Washington in 2019. He lives in East Fremont and loves to explore the city on his bike.