You can learn more about the Seattle Social Housing Developer at socialhousingseattle.org

The backers of the ballot measure approved handily by Seattle voters this week to create a business tax to fund the city’s new Social Housing program have a message for city leaders.

They are also expecting a legal challenge to the new tax.

“Despite a half million dollars in corporate spending and the unscrupulous tactics of our City Council and Mayor, last night Seattle voters delivered an unambiguous message: Now is the time for Seattle to take bold, innovative action to meet our housing and homelessness crises,” the House our Neighbors group said in a “Prop 1A Wins” statement.

Tallies show Seattle voters strongly supporting the new housing development effort with 69% backing the decision to fund the program and 58% supporting the House our Neighbors tax option to do it.

The approval opens the way for a new 5% tax on companies for every dollar over a million paid to a Seattle employee in annual compensation including salary, stock, and bonuses to fund the city’s new public Social Housing Developer. Backers say it will add up to around $50 million a year to fund the development authority and power its ability to borrow to build or acquire 2,000 units of housing over 10 years.

Support for the new tax outpaced the Seattle City Council’s $10 million alternative that would have utilized existing JumpStart funding and limited the Social Housing Developer to offering affordable housing to only the city’s lowest income levels, a restriction social housing advocates say undermines the purpose of the program and hopes of creating affordable housing across multiple tiers of income. That option was backed by big companies like Amazon, of course, and Mayor Bruce Harrell.

The vote could represent a challenge for Harrell as he seeks reelection this year.

“Last night’s results left no doubt that Seattle voters want our city to act quickly to create permanently affordable social housing for people living on a range of incomes — and we believe that our wealthiest corporations should help pay for it,” the group said.

House our Neighbors says it also is expecting “a legal challenge from the corporate interests who sought to defeat this measure.”

The results were part of strong progressive showing in the low-turnout February Special Election. CHS reported here on Election Night on the wave of support for the social housing tax and the landslide support for two levy renewals for Seattle Public Schools.

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