Housing, Arts and Civil Rights Committee 6/24/2026

All right, fantastic.

Good afternoon, everyone.

The June 24th, 2026 meeting of the Housing Arts and Civil Rights Committee will come to order.

It is 2.01 p.m.

I am Dionne Foster, chair of the committee.

Will the committee clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Rink?

Present.

Vice Chair Lin?

Here.

Chair Foster?

Here.

Chair, there are three members present.

All right, and please note that Council President Hollingsworth and Council Member Juarez have been excused and welcome everyone to the online special World Cup game day committee meeting of Housing, Arts and Civil Rights where we are mostly remote today.

If there is no objection, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

We will now open the hybrid public comment period.

Public comments should relate to items on today's agenda or the purview of the committee.

Clerk, how many speakers are signed up today?

We have no in-person speakers and four remote speakers.

Okay, fantastic.

Since there are fewer than 30 speakers, each speaker will have two minutes.

Clerk, will you please read the public comment instructions and we will, since there are no in-person speakers, we'll start with our online speakers.

The public comment period is up to 60 minutes.

Speakers will be called in the order in which they are registered.

Speakers will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of their time.

Speakers' mics will be muted if they do not and their comments within the allotted time to allow us to call on the next speaker.

The public comment period is now open.

We will begin with the first speaker on the list.

The first speaker will be Daniel Gray followed by Nick.

Okay, and Clark, do we need to give Daniel instructions to get off mute?

Yes.

So, let's see, Daniel should be allowed to talk and press star six when you hear the prompt and you've been unmuted.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

My name is Daniel Gray.

I would like to ask this committee for an audit of all rent increases in Office of Housing's portfolio since 2023, and to publish all operating budgets to the city's open data portal.

For years, Seattle's Housing Levy Oversight Committee has discussed that regulated affordable housing rents are often not actually affordable.

Meeting minutes state that market rate rents and restricted affordable rents are overlapping, where restricted rents can be higher than actual market rates.

They decided to address these high rents through underwriting.

But this approach isn't new.

Many existing land covenants already include controls on rent increases.

Yet, while OH has been acknowledging that rents are too high, they have also been advising their projects to increase rents above land covenants.

Looking at one project before debt restructuring, the Ski Attorney's Office actually described as an enormous cash-out The land covenant tied rent increases to equitable shares of operating costs.

And we cannot take increased operating expenses at base value.

I'll comment more on this at a later date.

After the cash out, the covenant changed to a CPI increase for approximately 4% a year.

Tenants have seen roughly 35% rent increases over three years, with another increase expected soon.

The land covenant also has directions on what to do when tenants have been overcharged.

Please publish project budgets to open data and please audit the rent increases for compliance with land covenants.

Ending with the August 2025 Housing Levy Oversight Committee Minute, I quote, because developers are finding they are having trouble leasing up oversupplied unit types, some are trying to get public funders to take on those projects, but the public absorbs the risk and financial loss instead of the developers who built a building.

Thank you.

All right, our next speaker will be Nick followed by Alberto.

Good afternoon, council members.

I'm here to comment on Council Bill 121236 regarding the ground lease property at 2929 27th Avenue South.

My name is Nick Tronis and I serve as the Director of Community Relations for the Rainier Valley Early Learning Campus where this site will house our Early Learning Campus.

and as a member of the University of Washington College of Education, we are beyond excited to be a partner in this project and I'm happy to lend my voice to encourage your support for what we envision.

Our vision is to create an early learning hub of excellence that does three things.

First, it will provide additional spots of high quality early learning and care for children in the Rainier Valley, especially those in the future housing units and this includes access to infant and toddler care.

Second, it'll create hands-on research and training opportunities for University of Washington students pursuing careers in early learning and education, everyone from classroom teachers to researchers to future policymakers.

And this is the main pillar of our project, to create a systemic and sustainable program to diversify and strengthen the early learning workforce here in Seattle and our state.

And lastly, the third, It will provide professional development opportunities for early learning providers, not only in the Rainier Valley and throughout Seattle, but across the state.

And we're also excited to share that several UW Health Sciences services, medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, social work, have agreed to lease two small offices within the building.

So think about vaccine clinics, dental hygiene workshops for children and families, and other similar programs.

and while these won't be fully clinical services, they will create meaningful opportunities for students to engage with the community while expanding access to health education.

With your support for this bill, this endeavor will not only strengthen the early learning workforce in our city and state, it also has the potential to become a national model for what a strong university community partnership in early learning could look like with strong support from our local leaders and government such as yourself.

Thank you for your time.

All right, and our next speaker will be Alberto Alvarez followed by Estelle Ortega.

Thank you.

Council makes these rules about voicing opinions on campaign issues or judicial matters.

Fact is, both are protected speech.

Example, there are council members who grandstand on the dais about their own campaign issues.

using our public dollars to grant TV and radio interviews, reciting their talking points, and using up government time to hold press conferences to polish their image.

To then tell the public that they cannot come to these chambers to openly disagree and criticize council members is arrogant and in violation of our freedoms to hold you all accountable.

As for judicial matters, we the public are well within our rights to look at any current matter in the courts and speak our opinion related to any pending adjudication.

The limit to comment on court matters is only on you as politicians who might be involved in such a court case.

However, the public has God-given rights to speak their peace.

All this to say, that Council should strike these rules that limit free speech from the public.

Politicians have the right to feel embarrassed or the right to feel ashamed.

Council has no right to tell us we can't criticize members for their political platform.

Thank you all and have a good day.

Our final speaker is Estela Ortega.

Good afternoon, Chair Foster and Council Members.

My name is Estela Ortega and I am the Executive Director of El Centro de la Rafa.

I'm here today to express our strong support for Council Bill 121-236 regarding the ground lease of the property at 2927th Avenue South.

We are proud to partner with Mercy Housing Northwest on this exciting, innovative, and transformative project.

Together, we have worked closely with the Office of Housing, multiple city departments, and outstanding design team to reimagine the Mount Baker Station area and create a vibrant, inclusive community that reflects the needs and aspirations of Seattle residents.

Through extensive public engagement, key themes emerged, creating a neighborhood that is welcoming, safe, diverse, accessible, and community-centered.

These values are at the heart of everything we are building.

This project will provide 241 new affordable homes for working families with strong emphasis on larger two, three and four bedroom apartments that are desperately needed in our city.

It will also include a new Rainier Valley Early Learning Campus in partnership with the University of Washington providing 35,000 square feet dedicated to childcare and educational opportunities.

In addition, the development will feature commercial space for locally owned businesses in partnership with the Office of Economic Development, helping to strengthen economic opportunities within the community.

At its center will be a large public open space where residents and neighbors can gather, celebrate, and connect with one another.

We are working under a very tight timeline to reach closing and begin construction as well.

For that reason, we respectfully ask for your support of the legislation before you today so that we can move forward in delivering these critical community benefits.

Mil gracias for your consideration and your commitment to creating affordable housing and thriving communities in Seattle.

Thank you.

And there are no additional registered speakers.

Great.

Fantastic.

Thank you so much.

And thank you to all of our public commenters today for joining us and sharing.

I really appreciate it.

With that, we will now move on to our first item of business.

Will the clerk please read item one into the record?

Agenda Item 1, Council Bill 121218, an ordinance relating to housing for low-income households.

Adopting the 2023 Seattle Housing Levy Administrative and Financial Plan from program years 2026 to 2028. Adopting housing funding policies for program years 2026 to 2028. for the 2023 Seattle Housing Levy and other fund sources, authorizing actions by the Director of Housing regarding past and future housing loans and contracts and ratifying and confirming certain prior acts for briefing discussion and possible vote.

Okay, thank you so much.

And colleagues, I'm really excited to have this in front of us today for our possible vote.

We are going to be voting on updates to the housing funding policies and administrative and financial plan, which directs how the Office of Housing administers their housing funds, including housing levy resources, MHA resources, and JumpStart dollars.

At our last meeting, we heard a presentation from the Office of Housing on this item.

And as a reminder, these items are updated every two years, and this legislation does not propose major updates, but rather builds on changes that were made in 2024. And I want to thank the Office of Housing team for their incredible work on this update, as well as for the Mayor's Office for bringing these forward.

Colleagues, I will be introducing an amendment to the legislation here in a moment, but prior to doing that, I want to acknowledge we are joined by Tracy Rathliff from Central Staff and provide an opportunity for any colleagues to ask final questions around the underlying legislation prior to moving the amendment forward.

So colleagues, I'll pause to see if there are any final questions there.

Okay, seeing none, you'll get another chance for it before we vote, but seeing none, I want to introduce an amendment that my office circulated to committee members yesterday, and you also received a physical copy of this amendment.

So what this amendment addresses is that as part of the 2025 NOFA awards, Office of Housing for the first time included debt restructuring and stabilization loans.

So that was already an allowable use of funds, but what this amendment does is it provides more details on the process for Office of Housing to make those funds available.

This amendment also clarifies that the Office of Housing may make supplemental funding adjustments in order to facilitate construction finance closing or to facilitate conversion from construction to permanent financing.

Again, this was already a practice in the Office of Housing, but providing some clarity and some boundaries at the HFP level we think is going to be helpful to provide that guidance and certainty for the Office of Housing.

And finally, it provides discretion to the Office of Housing for when they can require funding adjustments to be made administratively versus when those funding adjustments need to be done through a competitive process.

So those are the three things that are done in this amendment.

I may have just taken Tracy's job from her.

Sorry, Tracy.

But I'm sure there will be plenty of questions.

So with that, I want to move to amend Council Bill 121218 as presented on Amendment 1. Is there a second?

Second.

Fantastic.

It has been moved and seconded.

Are there comments or questions on Amendment 1?

Council Member Lynn, I see you're off mute, but I'm not sure if that was just to get ready to vote or not.

I was just to second it, but Council Member Pete knew to it, so.

Okay, fantastic.

And Tracy, I'll just offer if there's any additional comments that you wanted to provide on the context of the amendment, if I didn't take the whole show from you with my intro comments.

It's never a problem when the council members want to take our jobs away from us and who know well enough about what it is they're proposing that they can actually speak to it.

I think you did a fine job.

I would just add that I think this language, again, always just had a lot of authority, existing authority underneath the housing funding policies to do these kinds of allocations.

It's just providing a little more detail about what they're doing now, which is becoming a little bit more customary than what we've done in the past.

in terms of trying to deal with some of the challenges that our affordable housing portfolio is dealing with, particularly on the operations side.

So I think it just provides much more transparency about the types of activities that they're involved in to try to support our affordable housing providers.

So I think these are really good specific adds to the housing funding policies in terms of transparency and process.

Thank you for that, Tracy.

And I'll just close with expressing appreciation to the Office of Housing staff for working so closely with my office on this amendment and the feedback and collaboration to bring it forward.

I think it's something that we all think does a good job at meeting the need and elevating the transparency.

And so with that, I will ask for the clerk to please call the roll on the adoption of Amendment 1. Yes.

Vice Chair Lin?

Yes.

Chair Foster?

Yes.

Chair, there are three votes in favor, none opposed.

Fantastic.

The motion carries and Amendment 1 is adopted.

Colleagues, I will just turn to you one more time and check if there are any final comments or questions before we vote on Council Bill 121218 as amended.

All right.

Fantastic.

With that, I have moved that the committee recommend adoption of Council Bill 121218. Is there a second?

Second.

All right.

It is moved and seconded to recommend adoption of Council Bill 121218 as amended.

Are there any further comments?

Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption to pass...

No.

Okay.

The special World Cup edition.

Here we go.

All right.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation that the council pass that the council pass Council Bill 121218 as amended.

Council member Rink.

Yes.

Vice Chair Lynn.

Yes.

Chair Foster.

Yes.

Chair, there are three votes in favor and none opposed.

Fantastic.

The motion carries and the committee recommendation that the council pass the bill as amended will be sent to the June 30th, 2026 city council meeting.

Thank you so much, colleagues.

We will now move on to agenda item two.

Will the clerk please read item two into the record?

Agenda Item 2, Council Bill 121236, an ordinance relating to the Office of Housing granting a ground lease of real property located on 2929 27th Ave South, authorizing the Director of the Office of Housing to grant a lease of the real property to MBTOD Phase 1 LLLP, an affiliate of Mercy Housing Northwest and El Centro de la Raza.

and authorizing related agreements and actions to support the development of affordable housing and commercial space intended to be used for early learning, childcare center, and associated uses.

For briefing discussion and possible vote.

Fantastic.

Thank you so much for that, Clerk.

And we'll be hearing in just a moment from Interim Director of Office of Housing, Andrea Hikida and Jessica Gomez.

And they'll be presenting on this bill and joining virtually.

But prior to when I hand it over to them, I just want to say a few words about the next three bills that are in front of us.

And I'm excited about each of them for different reasons.

but they each demonstrate the opportunity for us to take on important work related to affordability in our city as well as to promoting home ownership and really high quality of living for our residents who are accessing housing through our Office of Housing portfolio.

We heard from our public commenters today from El Centro de la Raza as well as from the University of Washington about the importance of the Mount Baker site.

but I will just reiterate this site puts us on track to build 241 new units of affordable housing that is right next to a light rail station that is in a community that has right across from a high school and so many other important community connections and amenities.

I'm really grateful for the ongoing work and the leadership of El Centro, Mercy Housing, University of Washington, our partners at the state, and so many others who did hard work to get us here.

And I want to again express my appreciation to OH and the mayor's office on this.

All of our offices have been offered the chance to be briefed by Office of Housing on this prior to this committee meeting, and we will hear the presentation from OH on this item and then put it up for questions from committee members prior to proceeding for a vote.

As you heard from our public commenter at El Centro, folks are moving forward on a very important and tight construction timeline, and we want to make sure that we are able for them to proceed with their work.

With that, I am really pleased to hand it over to OH, who will share more details about this really important project.

And I should acknowledge, and I'm so excited to have Vice Chair Lynn, obviously, as this is taking place right in the heart of his district in District 2. So, looking forward to this presentation and conversation today.

Office of Housing team over to you.

Thank you very much, Chair Foster, and good afternoon, council members.

I'm Andrea Akita, the interim director of the Seattle Office of Housing, and I'll have Jessica introduce herself.

Good afternoon, everybody.

Jessica Gomez from the Office of Housing on the Policy and Planning team.

Great.

I'm very pleased to be here this afternoon with my colleagues from the Office of Housing and I'm exceedingly proud of the work that we're doing at OH where we partner to create affordable housing by equitably investing to prevent displacement and increase opportunities for people to live in Seattle.

Our work and our commitment is driven by a vision that I know is shared by council members for our city to be a place where everyone has a healthy and affordable home.

and we're excited to share progress on several projects that further OH's vision and mission.

So first up, the redevelopment of city-owned sites adjacent to the Mount Baker light rail station, a significant community, public and private collaboration.

The legislation for your consideration will authorize the Office of Housing to execute a 99-year ground lease for the first phase of redevelopment with a lease term that requires the development and operation of 239 units of affordable housing for households with low incomes, along with dedicated space for an early learning research facility.

I'll hand it over to Jessica, who will walk you through the steps we've taken to date and the actions that will follow.

Great.

Thank you so much, Andrea.

So this is a brief look at our timeline.

So just going back a little bit to refocus everybody.

In June of 2020, the University of Washington transferred the sites to the City of Seattle with a vision to develop affordable housing, education, research and clinical uses, including early learning and care on the site.

The site consists of three parcels totaling 3.79 acres.

And later on in June of 2023, the Office of Housing published a request for qualifications.

And later in October of 2023, a request for proposals was published.

In July of 2024, Mercy Housing Northwest and El Centro de la Raza were designated and awarded Phase I and II for an all-affordable rental project.

This month, demolition begins on the large laundry site building.

So we're very excited about that.

This fall in October 2026, construction closing will happen with the University of Washington Rainier Valley Early Learning Center going on the ground floor and 239 units of affordable housing with two manager units, so equaling 241 units will start.

In phase two, we'll start right after that with pre-development starting right after closing in October, hopefully starting pre-development in later last quarter of 2026 with an estimated goal of 191 units.

Next slide.

The project location, just to make sure everybody can see the map and get acquainted, it is in the Mount Baker neighborhood right outside the light rail station.

And on the right side, you can see the parcels outlined in yellow.

Next slide.

This is the 3D rendering of the vision for the site.

There are four buildings in total.

This development will integrate the surrounding community by making it accessible to transit riders, community members, and those going to the Rainier Valley Early Learning Center that's owned and operated by the University of Washington.

Next slide.

The project overview, as I mentioned earlier, Mercy Housing and El Centro La Raza are the developers.

This is a beautiful partnership coming together.

We're really excited about that.

A total of 239 affordable units.

Close to 60% of all the apartments will be two, three, and four bedrooms.

Zero, 30% AMI apartments are all family-sized apartments with two bedrooms and above.

There will be a community preference applied to the project addressing displacement pressures and the Rainier Valley Early Learning Center will be owned and operated by the UW, which will occupy the phase one ground floor.

The project will utilize a community workforce agreement during construction for phase one and then again for phase two.

Next slide.

And finally, the ground lease considerations before you today.

This ground lease would allow the city to continue ownership in perpetuity while the developer would own and operate the development constructed above.

Thank you for your consideration and we're open for questions.

Thank you so much for that fantastic presentation.

And again, just to express my excitement about this opportunity in front of us to vote on it today.

I did want to just do a quick clarification, and I think you already hit on this.

I'm not sure if it was Jessica or Interim Director Ankita.

If you heard myself or our commenter say the number 241, and then you heard OH say 239, the differences, the two management units that are in the building.

So I just wanted to make sure that that was clear for folks when we're talking about the number of units.

There are 241 overall, 239 that are going to be in this sort of subsidized affordable bucket, and two to make sure that we've got on-site management to make sure that we have all the support that the residents need.

So I wanted to lift that up for you, colleagues, and again, express how important this is going to be.

Also the provision of open space in a location where it's just very much needed.

With that, colleagues, I will open it up for questions.

All right.

I think I'm not seeing any questions coming from folks.

I think that's because we are all so excited about this opportunity.

And so with that, I will move that the committee recommend adoption of Council Bill 121236. Is there a second?

Second.

Fantastic.

It is moved and seconded to recommend adoption of the council bill.

Are there any further comments?

All right.

Will the clerk please call the roll at...

Oh, no.

Okay.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the recommendation that council pass council bill 121236?

Council member Rink?

Yes.

Vice Chair Lin?

Yes.

Chair Foster?

Yes.

Chair, there are three votes in favor and none opposed.

Fantastic.

The motion carries and the committee recommends that the council pass the bill, excuse me, the committee recommendation that the council pass the bill will be sent to the June 30th, 2026 city council meeting.

Thank you so much to our folks from OH one more time for all the work that you've done on this over the last several years.

I know it's been a huge undertaking and we cannot wait to see shovels in the ground later on this year.

With that, we will move on to agenda item three.

Will the clerk please read item three into the record?

Agenda Item 3, Council Bill 121237, an ordinance relating to the Seattle Office of Housing placing acquired real property in the Mott Lake neighborhood under the jurisdiction of OH, authorizing OH to issue a competitive request for proposals for selection of a preferred developer and to execute and deliver a contract for transfer of land, deed, and related documents to the selected developer and ratifying and confirming certain prior acts for briefing discussion and possible vote.

All right, thank you so much.

And so we will be joined this time by Interim Director Ankita, excuse me, I just kind of blended your first and last name, Interim Director Ankita, along with Joy Hunt from the Office of Housing.

And before we have them introduce themselves and walk through this ordinance, I just want to say, you know, committee members, as you all know, I'm really excited about the opportunities that affordable homeownership in particular plays for our city as an opportunity to create permanence and stability for families.

And this is, I think, an especially exciting opportunity because of the location in what we would sort of call a high opportunity neighborhood.

And that is not a place where we often get the opportunity to build affordable housing units and a particularly affordable home ownership units.

So we will hear more from the OH team about that momentarily.

And before we do that, I want to just express my gratitude to our partners at the state, including our 43rd legislative district delegation and staff at WSDOT, for working this year for the work that Director Akita will talk about that allows us to lease the site during pre-development and permitting to keep this project moving forward.

And colleagues, I will also just share with you a little bit of information about pre-introduction changes that my office worked alongside the Office of Housing on.

So after we reviewed the transmitted legislation, we've made the following changes.

We added a term sheet to the ordinance, which is consistent with past practices from the Office of Housing, The term sheet contains basic provisions for the future home ownership project site, including that it will serve households at 80% or below AMI and that the project will be affordable for at least 50 years.

OH was already looking at home ownership for this site and this edit just makes that more explicit in the legislation.

We also added a provision that OH will prioritize project proposals that spoiler alert surprise, include a significant number of family-sized units as that continues to be a priority for all of us.

And then finally, a provision that selected proposal will address pedestrian safety and environmental impacts.

And we'll hear more about that in the presentation later, but we wanted to make sure that the future development of this site was taking the surrounding area into consideration.

So again, I want to express my appreciation to the OH staff for working with us on making those changes pre-intro.

And with that, I will now hand it over to Joy and Director Akita.

Thank you, Chair Foster.

And thank you for expressing so much gratitude to all the folks who have been involved in getting us to this particular point in time.

I want to also thank our OH home ownership team, our policy and planning team, and the city's Office of Intergovernmental Relations.

This legislation will bring affordable homes to a community where home ownership has been far out of reach for households with low incomes.

And in the Montlake neighborhood, the Office of Housing has the opportunity, as you've described, to purchase a site from the Washington State Department of Transportation, WSDOT, The legislation before you authorizes OH to purchase a site for no more than $6,050,000 The property would be placed under OH's jurisdiction for the purpose of creating 50 or more permanently affordable for sale homes through a competitive request for proposal RFP process.

And upon completion of a successful RFP process, OH is authorized to transfer the site to the developer to steward the homes, ensuring that they remain affordable.

Joy Hatton- Hello everyone.

I'm Joy Hatton with the Office of Housing.

Thanks for having me here today.

I have a couple of framing slides and then we'll jump into the specifics of this exciting opportunity at Montlake Homes.

OH's investments in permanently affordable homeownership accomplish several key goals, including displacement prevention and ensuring essential workers can live in the communities they serve.

These are also investments for the long term.

OH funded homeownership homes must maintain affordability at resale for at least 50 years.

We prioritize funding investments with proposed affordability for 99 years or more.

Next slide please.

Buyers of permanently affordable homeownership homes make no more than 80% of area median income at initial sale.

Serving households below 80% of area median income is critical for homeownership for many reasons, one of which is that it supports our racial equity goals since we know median income is lower for households from communities that have historically experienced redlining and other forms of discrimination.

To ensure there's a band of buyers eligible to purchase permanently affordable homes, prices are typically set to be affordable to buyers who make 60 to 65% of area median income.

This affordable pricing means no more than 35% of pre-tax income may be used for housing, which for homeownership includes principal, interest, property taxes, insurance, HOA dues, and any stewardship fees.

To put these numbers in practical terms, in today's market, permanently affordable home homeownership homes generally range from $250,000 to $350,000 with one and two bedroom homes typically in the high 200s and three and four bedroom homes selling in the low to mid 300s.

One more slide to wrap up my framing of the model.

In permanently affordable homeownership, the home buyer purchases the home and leases the land from the stewardship organization in a long-term renewable lease.

In exchange, they agree to sell the home at a restricted price if they choose to sell in the future.

The stewardship organization owns the land and ensures homes are sold at affordable prices to income-eligible buyers in the event of resale.

Next slide, please.

The Montlake home site is located at 2625 East Montlake Place East.

This is the intersection of SR520, Montlake Boulevard, and East Roanoke Street.

This land was used by WSDOT for construction staging during the construction of SR520.

It's now vacant and considered surplus.

It has a no further action letter from the Washington State Department of Ecology.

During the 2026 session, our state legislator appropriated funds $6,050,000 for OH to acquire the site from WSDOT to develop at least 50 permanently affordable homes.

We will purchase a site from WSDOT for $5,800,000.

The balance of funds will be used for closing costs, title insurance, and potentially some survey work and other due diligence expenses.

Following ratification of the legislation under consideration today, OH will enter into a purchase and sale agreement with WSDOT and we subsequently expect to close on the purchase of the property this fall.

Our next step will be to issue a competitive request for proposals in early 2027 to select a permanently affordable home ownership developer to build homes on the site and provide stewardship services once construction is complete.

Through the RFP process, we intend to make an award reservation that will include both the land and a development subsidy loan.

Next slide, please.

This is an amenity-rich area.

The site is a short work to an elementary school, a library, a park, and retail in the Montlake neighborhood.

It's also worth noting that the Montlake neighborhood doesn't have any affordable home ownership opportunities currently, so we're very excited at the opportunity to build in Montlake.

The site is currently zoned NC1, which will allow us to develop up to four stories.

We understand the site is under consideration for rezoning to NC2, which would give our selected developer the option to go up to five or six stories.

As previously shared, our plan for this site is to release a request for proposals to select a permanently affordable home ownership developer.

who are targeting Q1 of 2027 for RFP release.

The request for proposals were encouraged for priorities.

First, as we've alluded to, family-sized housing will be a priority for the RFP.

Jessica and I had the pleasure of participating in a community engagement event hosted by the Motley Community Club this spring with approximately 70 Motley neighbors in attendance.

During that event, we heard a resounding support for affordable homeownership for families.

We also learned Montlake Elementary School was recently redeveloped and currently has significant capacity for more students.

Second, the RFP will prioritize trees and greenery between homes and SR520, as well as other green building and pollution mitigation strategies.

Our original assessment of the site indicated the potential to build up to 90 homes.

We reduced that number to a minimum of 50 homes to ensure there would be room for one to two rows of trees between homes and 520. The RFP will also encourage pollution mitigation strategies such as triple pane windows, high efficiency HVAC systems and other green building techniques.

A third RFP priority, we've heard from neighbors that they would like ground floor commercial at this site, ideally a grocery store.

The RFP will encourage ground floor commercial if financing for retail is identified, although we cannot guarantee that will be the case.

We want to be transparent in saying that there are challenges to doing this.

OHS development subsidy as well as the state housing trust fund are limited to funding residential development.

However, we will encourage developers to think creatively about how to include retail if possible, and we continue to welcome ideas for financing such development.

Fourth and finally, we've heard from neighbors an interest in having parking as well as support for creative strategies to mitigate congestion and to improve pedestrian experience around this site.

The Montlake's Homes RFP will reflect these four priorities.

and we're happy to entertain any questions you may have.

Thank you so much for that.

And I'll just say quickly, as a, maybe it's a comment question, you know, in regards to the commercial, the ground floor commercial opportunity there, my understanding is that the language is, if feasible, as described in the slide.

So encouraging that in the proposals, but not a requirement in the proposals, given the complexity that you already mentioned.

Is that correct?

Short summary, Joy?

Yes, absolutely.

Fantastic.

Thank you for that.

And I see a question from Councilmember Lynn.

Over to you.

Thanks so much for this presentation.

Super excited and agree with the idea of making sure that there's trees there to be a buffer between the highway off-ramp and the homes I think that's great and yeah there could be a corner store I'm sure the neighborhood and the homeowners would love it if that's possible if it's feasible so I agree with all of that in terms of the funding do we need to take budget action to accept funds where are we at with the funding for this there's a separate action that's this is included in supplemental to be able to receive those funds and then make them available to the office of housing Okay, thank you.

Okay, thank you so much for that, Councilmember Lynn.

Any other questions from the committee?

Fantastic.

Well, thank you so much for that overview OH and again for all the hard work on this.

I know it's been a while in the works again.

So with that, I move that the committee recommend adoption of Council Bill 121237. Is there a second?

Second.

Fantastic.

It is moved and seconded to recommend the adoption of the bill.

Are there any further comments?

All right, will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption that council passed Council Bill 121237. Council Member Rink?

Yes.

Vice Chair Lin?

Yes.

Chair Foster?

Yes.

Chair, there are three votes in favor and none opposed.

Fantastic.

The motion carries and the committee recommends that the council pass this bill.

This will be sent up to the June 30th, 2026 city council meeting.

Okay, with that we will move on to agenda item four.

Will the clerk please read item four into the record.

Agenda Item 4, Council Bill 121238. An ordinance relating to the Office of Housing authorizing the acquisition of two parcels in the central area for the purpose of developing affordable home ownership units, placing the property under the jurisdiction of the Office of Housing, authorizing the Director of the Office of Housing or the Director's designee to issue a request for proposals and to select a developer and thereafter to execute and deliver a contract for transfer of land, deed and related documents and ratifying and confirming certain prior acts for briefing, discussion and possible vote.

Fantastic.

Thank you so much, Clerk.

And before I bring back Interim Director Akita and Kelly Larson from the Office of Housing, I'm just going to share, I'm just so excited today.

All I got is sharing excitement.

But I want to share what makes the site special.

So for us, you know, we're getting a chance to accept a site that will be used for future affordable homeownership.

and to ensure that this historic site in the Central District can once again provide affordable housing.

And so I want to express my appreciation to the Central Area Development Association who operated this building for over 25 years and worked with the Office of Housing on the transfer of this site.

I had friends who actually lived in this building and friends who live on this block and very familiar with this site and I think it's just an incredible opportunity for the city.

As with the Montlake site, my office did work with Office of Housing on a few pre-introduction edits, so I want to share those again with folks just for the sake of transparency.

We added a term sheet, again, consistent with past practice, which has basic provisions for the future of homeownership on the site, including the 80% or below area median income and maintaining affordability for at least 50 years.

We also added a provision, I feel like somebody else could fill in the blank here, once again, that project proposals will provide a significant number of family-sized units.

And really, in particular, what I'm excited about this site, and I really want to say I'm so thrilled about this, is the utilization of community preference for homebuyer selection here, which, again, as we think about our historic Central District and the opportunity for homeownership, I think it's just going to be really meaningful down the line in the Central District, particularly where we've seen just so much displacement of Black residents and other community members who have historically called the Central District home.

and then finally the transmitted legislation had left the door open for either rental or homeownership and we updated that to reflect that the project would be homeownership focused.

So those are the pre-introduction changes I wanted to share with you colleagues.

With that and hopefully without stealing too much fire from OH, I will be handing it over to Interim Director Akita and Kelly Larson to walk us through the details of this location.

Thank you very much.

And I'll be joined by Joy Hunt once again.

And I just love it when I'm so aligned and we are so aligned with our committee chair.

And so at the risk of being redundant, I will repeat some of the information.

And this project, I will say, is a little bittersweet because it reflects the end of one building's life and the significant challenges that are faced by community based organizations.

to effectively operate affordable housing in the current environment.

And at the same time, it offers us hope for a future vision at the site that upholds a commitment to the legacy of the central area that has been core to CATA's work in their community and in this place.

So the proposed legislation before you authorizes the Office of Housing to acquire two parcels in the central area for the purpose of developing permanently affordable home ownership.

OH will enter into a settlement agreement accepting the deed to the Harvey apartments in lieu of foreclosure and purchase the adjacent parcel to the apartments.

We will conduct a competitive request for proposal process for the redevelopment of these sites.

In the next slide, please, I'll provide some background and context for the proposed action.

In 1999, the Central Area Development Association, CADA, acquired the Harvey Apartments along with an undeveloped parcel of land that's next door to the apartment building.

And as Chair Foster noted, for more than 25 years, CADA owned and operated the Harvey, providing affordable rental homes in the heart of the central area.

And this was made possible in a very small part with, over time, $1.2 million of financing from the Office of Housing.

The Harvey is an old building, and Cato was able to maintain the building but the physical condition has severely deteriorated over time and this has eventually led to the building being underutilized.

Occupancy has declined and by July 2025, all the remaining tenants have been relocated to other affordable homes.

after exploring options for transfer or sale, CADA and OH have reached a settlement agreement which necessitates the proposed council action.

Next slide, please.

So this gives you a view of where the properties are located.

The parcels are situated at the corner of 27th Avenue East and East Cherry Street.

And in the slide, you can see Cherry Street at the top of the photo and the red rectangle outlining what's labeled as Parcel A is the Harvey Apartments and beneath that is the vacant adjacent property labeled Parcel B.

And now we'll look ahead to discuss future development plans for this site.

Our intention is to build permanently affordable resale restricted homes at this location.

As previously shared, these are homes that would be affordable to initial and successive buyers below 80% of area median income.

Typical professions of affordable homeownership buyers might be teachers and childcare workers, healthcare technologists and nursing assistants, transit drivers, and nonprofit professionals.

For the Harvey site, in 2027, we will release a competitive request for qualifications to select a community-based organization to lead community engagement, to help us firm up plans for redevelopment.

We'll solicit input on the number and type and configuration of homes, as well as design strategies to meet the needs of current and or displaced community members and reflect the history and feel of the neighborhood.

When complete, as previously alluded to, homes will be marketed to households with ties to the community using community preference.

Community preference prioritizes housing opportunities for residents at risk of displacement or those seeking to return to neighborhoods from which they have been displaced.

Ties may include living in the Central District, previously living there, working there, volunteering there, or being part of a faith community located in the neighborhood.

Winters with such ties will be prioritized for homeownership opportunities created at the site.

And with that, we'll pause for your questions.

Thank you so much.

Colleagues, any questions on this item?

All right.

Seeing none, I will move that the committee recommend adoption of Council Bill 121238. Is there a second?

Second.

All right.

It has been moved and seconded to recommend the adoption of the Council Bill.

Are there any further comments?

Fantastic.

Will the Clerk please call the roll on the recommendation that the Council pass Council Bill 121238?

Council Member Rink?

Yes.

Vice Chair Lin?

Yes.

Chair Foster?

Yes.

I'm sure there are three votes in favor and none opposed.

Fantastic.

The motion carries and the committee recommends the council pass the bill.

This will be sent to the June 30, 2026 Seattle City Council meeting.

Is there any further business to come before the committee today?

Councilmember Reek.

Thank you, Chair.

I want to commend you for pulling together such a positive agenda for today's committee meeting.

It's not often you get to go back to back to back approving and taking action on such an array of incredible projects.

I really want to thank you and your team.

Thank you, Sage, for being in chambers as well, clerking this meeting.

And also a huge thank you to OH for clearly the years of work that have gone into preparing and getting these projects ready to go.

Please don't interpret my lack of questions as a lack of curiosity nor excitement about these projects, but rather the OH team did a really careful job setting materials ahead of time and answering questions ahead of time.

So I was just ready to enthusiastically support today.

So huge thank you again to the OH team and to your team chair and for putting together such a positive agenda.

Thank you so much for that, Councilman Brink.

I really appreciate it.

And as you know, I share all the excitement.

All right, unless there's any other business to come before the committee today, fantastic.

I will just share quickly to make sure folks are aware for the public.

My office is planning to hold a special meeting on Monday, June 29th at 9.30 in council chambers and an announcement of the special meeting should be sent out later this week.

We colleagues, you have already received this.

We've often sent some email communication out about this as well to the public.

We will be discussing potential homeowner privacy and protection legislation which would create a do not solicit list that homeowners can opt into if they do not wish to receive real estate solicitations.

We will have this on as an informational item only and we will also be holding a special panel discussion with community leaders who will speak to the impact of unwanted solicitation on their communities across the city.

So I'm really looking forward to seeing committee members and the public there.

And with that, that concludes the June 26th or June 24th 2026 meeting of the Housing, Arts and Civil Rights Committee.

Our next scheduled meeting is July 8th.

And thank you for attending.

It is 2.51 p.m.

and we are adjourned.

Thank you, Chair.

Thanks, everyone.