Published on December 17, 2019
The City of Seattle Office of Housing on Dec. 9 announced funds to develop Seattle’s first affordable senior housing development designed to be an affirming environment for LGBTQ seniors and the greater LGBTQ community.
The project is led by Capitol Hill Housing, a nonprofit developer, along with GenPRIDE, the first LGBTQ-affirming senior center in Seattle/King County, which will serve as the primary service provider in the building. The funding will create 125 units of affordable housing and it plans to include some set-aside units for transgender and/or HIV positive seniors earning less than 30% of the area medium income.
“As a community collaborator on this project, I’m proud to be part of bringing LGBTQ-affirming affordable housing to Seattle,” said Karen Fredriksen Goldsen, a University of Washington professor of social work, director of the UW Aging with Pride study and GenPRIDE founder.
GenPRIDE’s partnerships and programming will support LGBTQ seniors across the city, making the building a hub for the LGBTQ community and providing a senior center for all seniors in the local Capitol Hill area. Other community organizations collaborating on the project include UW Aging with Pride, Ingersoll Gender Center, Seattle Counseling Service, Gay City, POCAAN, the Greater Seattle Business Association, LGBTQ Allyship and Country Doctor Community Clinic. “It all starts with bringing our diverse community to the table and working together to create a shared vision to ensure housing stability while honoring and strengthening the lives of those seniors that have historically been marginalized yet have been on the forefront of building these communities,” Fredriksen Goldsen said.
Continue reading at the UW School of Social Work News & Events.
Originally written by the UW School of Social Work.