Incentive Zoning for Affordable Housing

Apropos the discussions of affordable housing here and here, on Tuesday October 7 at 5:30 p.m, the Seattle City Council will hold a public hearing on proposed incentive zoning legislation that would tie increases in allowed building heights to the provision of affordable housing. This PI piece provides a good overview.

The two main points of contention are income eligibility and set-aside percentage. John Fox of the Seattle Displacement Coalition contends that the proposed 80% of area median income cutoff is set too high to benefit most “workers.” Meanwhile most affordable housing advocates, as well as some local developers, agree that the set aside should be higher than the 11% dictated by existing code for the downtown zones (note: that’s 11% of the “bonused” floor area only).

More broadly, resistance to the idea of incentive zoning is tangled up in misconceptions about density and growth. When housing prices and density rise in concert as they have in Seattle in recent years, there are those who speciously assume a causal relationship. But the true reason for rising housing prices — housing bubble aside — is that Seattle has become a successful and desirable city.  In other words, it’s supply and demand. There are countless examples across history of affordable high density, and there’s a word that often applies: slum.

If, as John Fox espouses, we were to curtail densification in order to preserve existing affordable housing, the end result would be a net loss of affordability city-wide due to supply and demand. Furthermore, such a curtailment would drive growth further afield and exacerbate sprawl.  And that means more people throwing time and money away on long, single-occupancy vehicle commutes, for which we all will end up paying the social and environmental costs.

Density and affordable housing can coexist in a thriving city, and indeed, it is imperative that we figure out how to facilitate that outcome in Seattle.  If we get the details right, incentive zoning could be a productive strategy.  But we should also recognize that, because someone has to pay for it, other, more direct government subsidies will also need to be part of the solution.Â