AN ORDINANCE relating to the Multifamily Housing Property Tax Exemption Program; amending Sections 5.73.010, 5.73.020, 5.73.030, 5.73.040, 5.73.050, 5.73.060, 5.73.070, 5.73.080, 5.73.090, 5.73.100, and 5.73.110, adding Section 5.73.105, and repealing Section 5.73.120 of the Seattle Municipal Code to renew and modify the Multifamily Housing Property Tax Exemption program.
The report the Housing Affordability, Human Services and Economic Resilience Committee Agenda Item eight Council Bill 118505 relating to the multi-family housing property tax exemption program and exemptions. That's fine. Councilmember O'Brien. Okamoto. Excuse me. Councilmember Okamoto look alike, don't we? Yes. Thank you very much. The multi-family tax exemption program really has been foundational to the city's efforts, along with the housing levy to build affordable housing. This council bill will extend the program further. It's also a program that has taken Office of Housing, has taken seriously audit findings to strengthen and build the program even better. There are policy changes that were recommended by the. Executive that were consistent with. The ballot committee. In our committee, there were two further amendments that were made that, in my view, further strengthen the program, scaled it up for larger multifamily units, and then passed out of the committee with council. Members who want got in Burgess and the chair supporting it. Councilmember Lakota abstained from voting, in part because he has two. Amendments that he would like to present. I view those amendments as friendly. Amendments will second them and support them when they are made. I'd like to also. Say that while the housing levy and. The multifamily tax exemption has been. Foundational to the work of building more affordable. Units, it's not our work is not yet complete. That work will be completed by the implementation of the Hallow recommendations that were adopted in the well. The work program. Was adopted by. The resolution. Earlier in the in the meeting. Finally, I'd like to say thank you to the Office of Housing. For really working this program hard, finding ways to strengthen it and to make it a even better tool than what it is. I want to remind my colleagues here that we will be going to the state legislature to further enhance the program. That is not part. Of these recommendations, but is still essential to be done to really fulfill the recommendations by the Heller Committee. So with that, I would urge my colleagues to take a look at the two amendments coming forward in support support the Council Bill. Thank you. Councilmember Licata. But thank Katsura Okamoto for looking at these amendments and supporting them. I'm going to read both of them off. Perhaps we could do with them as a single vote. The first is this section was on Salon document on page 77 line 14, but is section 5.73.120 expiration program. The legislation came to us from the executive with recommendation that it be a permanent program. And what this does is set a four year period as we've had similarly in the past past four programs. They come again before the City Council for approval, as I've stated before in this morning's briefing session and at our committee meeting. I think it's important for the Council to be engaged in this program, since it is one of the major programs we have in this city providing affordable housing. And it's, as I say, in in line with what we've done in the past. The Second Amendment, this is on page 75, line three. It basically directs the director will annually analyze rent level information for affordable units in buildings that basically have received a certificate of exemption at the seven year period. What this does is it allows us to compare rent levels for market rate units of comparable size and age located in the neighborhoods. This will help us do an analysis for the directors annual report as to the effectiveness of the of of this program. Thank you. Any questions? Comments. Councilmember Harrell, we. Did hear some testimony about trying to insert prevailing wage in the MFT program. I was always very interested in trying to accomplish that. I just wanted to say for the viewing public that it's at least my understanding that it does raise significant legal issues and that to some extent is inconsistent with some of the authority that we have. And I'm sure that I'm going to assume that that's why this is not part of this legislation. But, you know, I used that expression earlier. In a perfect world, we'd have many different things, but unfortunately it does not look like we can accomplish that in this legislation. But I did appreciate the comments made during public comment. Q Any other comments or questions. We need a second on this on these? Yes. And according to the clerk, we need to do these individually. Okay. So why don't you begin with your exploration? I remove the amendment regarding the expiration of the program. Seconds. Any further discussion? And Councilmember Okamoto, second at that amendment, is all in favor of adopting the amendment on expiration vote. I. I opposed vote no. The amendment is unanimously adopted and now the Second Amendment. Second Amendment is to section D on page 75, line three. And I had previously read that amendment second. Thank you. Any further questions or comments? All in favor of the Second Amendment from Councilmember Licata on reporting. Vote I. I oppose Vote No. That amendment is also unanimously adopted. Are there any other comments on the ordinance? I as a member, Licata. I want to thank the Councilmembers for amending the legislation in front of us. With these two amendments. I. I have mixed feelings about this program. It is one of the main programs that the city relies on for affordable housing, and there have been some positive improvements to this version, particularly moving it up to 25% from 20% for the smaller units and also for encouraging units that have three and four bedrooms. So I will be supporting this legislation, but I think it's important for us to keep in mind that this is not a free program. We often refer to it as a tax shifting mechanism, but the research that the auditor due to the auditor's research we've discovered, not easily, I should mention, because there is some difficulty in extracting this information to King County that, well, there's about $12 million in tax shift, about actually about 10% of that 1.2 million in the past have actually been from revenue that we have foregone in the general fund. So there is a subsidy from the general fund. The discussion I think, that needs to happen going forward is given the subsidy that we have in this fund, is this the wisest use of our of our general fund to provide affordable housing in this in this makeup where we have a limit of 12 years? And also whether this is the particular groupings we want to provide affordable housing to and also in what neighborhoods. But that's a longer analysis. We've looked at it and poked at it in the past. We're not going to do that here. But I hope with these amendments, at least, we set the stage to make sure that we continue to monitor this program and at least assure ourselves or see if we can assure ourselves that this is a program that is cost effective in providing low income housing. Thank you. Any other comments? Please call the rule on the passage of the amended bill. Okamoto, I Rasmussen. I. So want back I got in I Harrell I Licata I O'Brien hi and President Burgess nine in favor in and opposed. The bill passes and the chair will sign it. The report of the Transportation Committee Item nine has been held until October five, so please read item ten.