Social Housing

Seattle Proposition 1A would tax excess compensation to fund mixed-income social housing. The Urbanist endorses a yes on 1A vote and urges you to vote by the February 11 deadline.

Join The Urbanist and House Our Neighbors at TeKu Tavern Monday February 3rd at 6pm to socialize and hear about Prop 1A.

Seattle must embrace bold zoning changes in Queen Anne and similar neighborhoods to preserve our city's promise for future generations. We need a lot more housing in all parts of Seattle. Seattle isn’t full. Queen Anne isn’t full.

New renderings, created by Neiman Taber Architects, present a vision for voters of what publicly-funded social housing would look like in Seattle. A dedicated funding source for social housing is on the ballot in February via Prop 1A.

Join House Our Neighbors for a Prop 1A campaign kick-off event 5:30pm Saturday, November 9. The ballot measure would fund social housing with an excess compensation tax and is up for a February 11th special election.

King County Council advanced a motion from Girmay Zahilay commissioning a study of a billion-dollar bond for workforce housing, but questions remain about how to guarantee the bonds and structure the program.

Seattle Councilmember Maritza Rivera and three other councilmembers sponsored a competing measure seeking to elbow out a ballot initiative funding social housing. The two measures will go to voters in February. Only one can pass.

King County Councilmember Girmay Zahilay rolled out the Regional Workforce Housing Initiative this week, aiming to use bonding to boost family-sized workforce housing construction. Colleagues were largely supportive, but warned the devil was in the details.