The Snohomish City Council at a meeting in the upper level of the Carnegie Building in September 2022. The council meets at 6 p.m. on the first and third Tuesday of each month at the Carnegie Building, typically in the lower level.
Photo by Michael Whitney.
SNOHOMISH — A slate of additional citywide developer incentives for affordable housing got the OK last week.
These include an up to 50% reduction in traffic impact fees, waiving utility fees and the option to either take an up to 50% reduction in park impact fees or a trade-off to reduce how much green space a development’s layout needs. It also offers incentives through reducing parking space requirements and more.
A developer can obtain the incentives by the units rented at rates affordable to people earning 60% or less of the county’s median income. The county’s average median income is $101,532.
What’s defined as affordable is being not more than 30% of a family’s annual income. The county’s 60% AMI this year is $60,919, so the rent would need to be no more than $1,522.97 monthly ($18,275.70 in rent a year.)
By taking the incentives, developers commit to keeping designated units rented at affordable housing prices for 50 years under binding covenants with the city, and there’s no skimping on the affordable housing units: They must be consistently the same sizes and maintained on the same upgrade schedules as the market-rate units.
At least 10% of the units must be affordable to get incentives, and the incentives are enlarged if 25% or 50% of the units are at affordable rates. (A four-unit building must have 25% or more affordable units to get incentives.)
Last week, the City Council voted 7-0 to approve.
Before the council’s vote, residents gave mixed views both favoring and opposing the idea.
One resident described Snohomish has two economies: Those who work in Snohomish but can’t afford to live here, and others who live here but commute to higher-paying jobs outside the city.
A city survey last year identified that a large number of people who live in town work outside Snohomish to afford living in Snohomish.
The incentives are “not going to help the people who need it ... it will be creating growth unnecessarily,” resident Scott Zaro said.
A third resident said the minimum requirements for affordable units aren’t large enough. These incentives will let developers “do a minimum amount for affordable housing and charge market rates for everyone else,” she said.
A fourth said that incentivizing development will increase traffic, but the city needs to ensure it can accommodate the added residents.
Resident Jim Lewis opposed giving developers the option to reduce how much green space is required on a site. It could result in children in the apartments not having play areas near them.
A representative from the Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish Counties praised the incentives.
City planners benchmarked the income level based on the county’s AMI which is updated annually. The county’s latest 60% AMI is $60,919. The city’s own 60% AMI is lower at $49,038.60, but the city doesn’t want to use it because that is only updated every five years and has a larger margin of error.
At last week’s meeting, some City Council members encouraged city planners to continue developing ideas to widen the types of affordable housing that can be built in Snohomish. Others want to make sure Snohomish’s affordable housing measures can reach the lowest-waged people who earn less than $30,000 a year. (On the county’s scale where the median is $101,532 a year, $30,000 a year is about 29% AMI.)
A minimum wage worker working 30 hours a week part time would earn $25,396.80 for the year at the state’s minimum of $16.28 an hour.
