Challenge Seattle is an organization designed to increase moderately priced housing in Seattle. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File)

Challenge Seattle is an organization designed to increase moderately priced housing in Seattle. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File)

Amazon, Starbucks, Boeing, others address affordable housing

Several are the same companies that opposed Seattle’s head tax last year.

After years of rising housing costs, an explosion of homelessness, and communities being priced out of cities and urban counties, the region’s wealthiest companies and CEOs are at last acknowledging the housing crisis.

Presidents and CEOs of some of the area’s largest corporations, including Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Kevin Johnson of Starbucks, and Kevin McAllister of Boeing, along with 14 other companies, announced the creation of Challenge Seattle, an organization designed to increase moderately priced housing. A report issued by the organization, which also partnered with cities and King County, said the housing crisis is making it harder for companies to attract and retain employees. “We are at risk of losing our economic edge. Our relatively low cost of doing business and our high quality of life have helped make us a global center of innovation and allowed us to attract and retain leading businesses and talent from around the world. If we do not act, we risk our economic future,” the report said.

Unlike many other housing strategies, Challenge Seattle’s proposal focuses on middle-income housing. Though housing stock has been created at twice the national rate from 2008 to 2017, the report said that in the same period, median home values increased by 58 percent compared to 19 percent nationally.

This has priced many people out and driven moderate-income employees in both public and private jobs to live further from their jobs in areas they can afford—driving many public employees, like first responders and teachers, out of the communities they serve. As middle-income people are forced from expensive cities, the report said, this also hurts low-income households, who must compete for affordable housing with middle-income earners.

In response, Challenge Seattle listed ways both municipalities and companies could help address middle-income housing: “The private sector must step up in new ways—particularly to provide low-cost capital and affordable land. The public sector must adopt smart policies and regulations that break down barriers.” Among other suggestions: discounting the cost of land or donating it outright for housing, which could lower the total development cost 15 to 30 percent. Washington state is the fifth most expensive state in the country in which to buy land. Alternatively, landowners could provide long-term leases at below market rates.

Cities could change zoning to increase density. In Seattle some 75 percent of residential land is zoned for single-family houses, compared to only 40 percent in other large cities like Chicago, Brooklyn, and Boston, the report said. Cities could further allow subdivisions to create cottage housing on existing plots of land, and dense transit-oriented development should be encouraged near transit corridors. Cities could additionally extend housing tax incentives to middle-income developments, like those currently offered in many places, including the low-income-housing tax credit or the multifamily tax exemption, which give property developers a break on taxes in exchange for creating a certain amount of affordable units.

While the organization’s recommendations are nonbinding, King County Executive Dow Constantine and several mayors (including those of Seattle, Federal Way, Bellevue) have signed onto it. Challenge Seattle is being headed by former Governor Christine Gregoire.

Challenge Seattle comes after Microsoft announced earlier this month that it would provide $500 million to subsidize middle-income housing across the county. Some $225 million was specifically earmarked for subsidizing middle-income housing in several cities and another $250 million would be used to promote low-income housing across King County. The remaining $25 million will go to philanthropic grants addressing homelessness.

It also comes in the wake of last year’s Seattle City Council passage and then repeal of an employee head tax on large employers. The tax would have levied a $275-per-employee tax on large corporations in the area to fund affordable housing, homelessness services, and emergency shelters. Predicted to raise $47 million annually, it was repealed before it went into effect. The opposition to the head tax was organized and funded by several of the organizations now involved in Challenge Seattle, including Amazon, Alaska Airlines, and Starbucks.

This story originally appeared in the Seattle Weekly, a sibling paper of The Daily Herald.

Talk to us

> Give us your news tips.

> Send us a letter to the editor.

> More Herald contact information.

More in Northwest

Alaska Airlines aircraft sit in the airline's hangar at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport Wednesday, Jan. 10, 2024, in SeaTac, Wash. Boeing has acknowledged in a letter to Congress that it cannot find records for work done on a door panel that blew out on an Alaska Airlines flight over Oregon two months ago. Ziad Ojakli, Boeing executive vice president and chief government lobbyist, wrote to Sen. Maria Cantwell on Friday, March 8 saying, “We have looked extensively and have not found any such documentation.” (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)
FBI tells passengers on 737 flight they might be crime victims

Passengers received letters this week from a victim specialist from the federal agency’s Seattle office.

Skylar Meade (left) and Nicholas Umphenour.
Idaho prison gang member and accomplice caught after ambush

Pair may have killed 2 while on the run, police say. Three police officers were hospitalized with gunshot wounds after the attack at a Boise hospital.

Barbara Peraza-Garcia holds her 2-year-old daughter, Frailys, while her partner Franklin Peraza sits on their bed in their 'micro apartment' in Seattle on Monday, March 11, 2024. (AP Photo/Manuel Valdes)
Micro-apartments are back after nearly a century, as need for affordable housing soars

Boarding houses that rented single rooms to low-income, blue-collar or temporary workers were prevalent across the U.S. in the early 1900s.

Teen blamed for crash that kills woman, 3 children in Renton

Four people were hospitalized, including three with life-threatening injuries. The teenage driver said to be at fault is under guard at a hospital.

Whidbey cop accused of rape quits job after internal inquiry

The report was unsparing in its allegations against John Nieder, who is set to go to trial May 6 in Skagit County Superior Court on two counts of rape in the second degree.

LA man was child rape suspect who faked his death

Coroner’s probe reveals the Los Angeles maintenance man was a Bremerton rape suspect believed to have jumped off the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.

Logo for news use, for stories regarding Washington state government — Olympia, the Legislature and state agencies. No caption necessary. 20220331
Edmonds rep’s bill would try to stop police from lying in interrogations

Rep. Strom Peterson’s measure aims to make statements inadmissible if police use deceptive tactics to get those statements.

The exterior doors of Boeing's 737 assembly factory are shown closed Wednesday, March 27, 2019, in Renton, Wash. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)
Boeing mechanics in Renton mis-installed piece that blew off plane, whistleblower says

A source says the fuselage panel that blew off an Alaska Airlines jet earlier this month was reinstalled improperly at the Boeing facility in Renton.

Yvonne Gallardo-Van Ornam, left, and Clyde Shaver
Arlington council member to run for state rep against Shavers

Yvonne Gallardo-Van Ornam called it a “little embarrassing” to have Oak Harbor Rep. Clyde Shavers “representing veterans.”

Sen. Marko Liias, D-Edmonds, chair of the Senate Transportation Committee, at right, looks over at Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima, ranking minority member of Senate Transportation Committee, at left, after participating in a panel during a legislative session preview in the Cherberg Building at the Capitol, Thursday, Jan. 4, 2024 in Olympia, Wash. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)
Edmonds senator wants LGBTQ+ history taught in public schools

Sen. Marko Liias, D-Edmonds, is the bill’s prime sponsor and one of the Legislature’s LGBTQ+ members.

Logo for news use featuring Whidbey Island in Island County, Washington. 220118
Island County pays $2.75M to former Navy chief shot after standoff

A lawsuit alleged the Island County Sheriff’s Office was responsible for “state-created danger.”

West Beach Road was closed and residents were evacuated during the wind storm Tuesday. (John Fisken / Whidbey News Times)
Whidbey homes damaged, road closed, ferry rocked in wild wind storm

A wind storm toppled a tree onto a house, canceled ferry trips and prompted evacuations Tuesday.

Support local journalism

If you value local news, make a gift now to support the trusted journalism you get in The Daily Herald. Donations processed in this system are not tax deductible.