Housing

Washington State passed HB1110 and HB2321 at the beginning of the year. Each bill increases housing types and densities in cities around Seattle in their own ways. While there are many opinions on those bills, they are now law.

The housing shortage in the region has been getting worse for a while. These pressures have sent house prices into the stratosphere and now even successful professionals are finding homeownership unattainable and first time buyers have been completely priced out. Those two laws needed to be enacted by July - a very short time for zoning changes.

The City made changes in late June to satisfy the state requirements within their deadline, yet there is more we can do as a community to address housing within our borders.

Now it’s up to us as a city to decide how we meets the needs of our own community, addressing needs like aging in place, having attainable homes for growing families, and increasing opportunities for home ownership over renting, and we need to do so carefully and precisely.

We still have local control of setbacks, height limits, tree clearances and critical area buffers, and a host of other codes. It is imperative that we carefully construct our next zoning update to accommodate  a new diversity of housing while maintaining Lake Forest Park’s green, tree covered Pacific Northwest character.

This doesn’t mean high density condos or row-housing – we aren’t Seattle after all. This means a code that encourages thoughtfully designed properties in appropriate architectural styles that have the same impact on the community that a large single family home would. This will mean more ADUs, duplexes, and hopefully even multi-unit properties that outwardly look no different from the Lake Forest Park architecture we know but that keep our elders here and invite more families and first time buyers find their home here.