How You Can Help With Housing in Seattle

Simple Actions Items For the Next Week or Two

A few weeks ago, I wrote that Mayor Harrell had thrown in the towel on housing. His 20-year plan to make the housing deficit deeper will drive prices higher and push more people into cars and onto the street. 

It turns out I was not the only one to notice! In fact I was quite flattered when a member of the national press chimed in about my piece. 

This and many, many other critiques, including basic factual reporting from the Seattle Times, have raised questions about Mayor’s Harrell’s seriousness when it comes to housing.

Fortunately, the Complete Communities Coalition is doing something productive about it. 

They have brought together a broad array of groups–from the Chamber and Commercial Real Estate groups to Habitat for Humanity, House our Neighbors, and policy advocacy groups like Futurewise, and many more. 

The coalition has been engaging with electeds and have put together a strong agenda for significantly improving the comprehensive plan that they believe is still politically feasible in the current environment. 

I think it is very well constructed for that exact purpose, and I think a bit of volunteering in the next week or two would be an excellent use of your time. 

The affordability of our city may depend on it! 

Action Items

Here are their action items. Please sign up for their alerts as well.

If you have not, you can also use the coalition’s policy priorities as an easy template for writing to your city councilmember–here is how to identify, and contact them. Make sure you also email Tanya Woo and Sara Nelson, the city councilmembers who are supposed to represent the entire city. 

Also, please contact Bruce Harrell’s office with the same pitch. 

If you are in any way a part of the constituency he seems to value most–such as longtime Seattleites, single family homeowners, or maybe business owners, and certainly if you were a Harrell voter–please let him know. Avoid using “urbanist” or “activist” language. The word among advocates around town is that he does not consider such people real Seattleites, or at least not representative of them.

Godspeed!