Published on August 26, 2019
Had U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell stood at 1 S. Madelia St. just a few years ago, she would have been in a used car lot. But on Tuesday, she was in the the lobby of an affordable housing complex now home to more than 100 residents.
Cantwell was joined by Spokane leaders on Tuesday as she championed federal legislation that, if passed, aims to spur the development of 9,700 new units of affordable housing in Washington state and thousands more across the country over the next decade – units just like the ones on South Madelia Street. Introduced by Cantwell and Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Medina, in June, the Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act of 2019 would expand existing tax incentives for affordable housing development. Its proponents claim that the legislation would add 550,000 units of affordable housing in the United States over the next decade, in addition to the more than 1 million already projected under the existing Low Income Housing Tax Credit program.
City officials highlighted the need for more affordable housing in Spokane. The vacancy rate of Spokane County apartments is 2%, according to the most recently available report on the apartment market from the University of Washington’s Runstad Department of Real Estate and Washington Center for Real Estate Research.
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Originally written by Adam Shanks for The Spokesman-Review.