Voting in the February 2025 Special Election is underway. Ballots are due by February 11th.

• Social housing funding vote: Ballots are being mailed for the February 11th Special Election including a vote on a new Seattle Social Housing payroll tax featuring a proposal from housing advocates and a competing proposal form the Seattle City Council. Seattle voters will face two questions when filling in the bubbles — 1) Should either of these proposals be approved? and 2) Which one? The Let’s Build Social Housing ballot Initiative 137 would add a 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. A Seattle City Council-backed alternative would not create a new tax, instead amending the existing JumpStart payroll tax to provide $10 million annually to the Seattle Social Housing Developer in funding administered by the Office of Housing for five years with an option for extending the program. The House our Neighbors group behind the salary tax proposal says it would 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. Social housing advocates, meanwhile, have blasted the city council alternative saying the proposal would slash funding to the newly formed developer while also limiting how that funding can be used in ways that would undermine the effort’s key tenets around expanding affordable housing to include a wider range of income levels. Under the proposition, JujmpStart funding would limit the Social Housing Developer to offering affordable housing to only the city’s lowest income levels.
• School levy replacements: The February ballot also includes a vote on replacing two expiring levies to fund Seattle Public Schools. While the city’s voters have typically enthusiastically backed school spending in past votes, the new ballot arrives fresh after a tense reversal by the district on a school closure plan that has bolstered criticism of the state’s largest school system. The new proposed operations levy would provide SPS with $747 million to pay its faculty and staff while the new capital levy proposal weighs in at around $1.8 billion to help the district construct new buildings and facilities. The capital levy faces increased skepticism after the fall’s showdown over closures as the district has focused increased resources on larger campuses including the proposed closure of North Capitol Hill’s Stevens Elementary that was planned to include consolidation of its student boundaries with the newly overhauled Montlake Elementary School and its $64.8 million renovation and expansion. Voters will consider each levy replacement proposal separately with yes/no votes on each. UPDATE: Looming over all of this are the increasing challenges to local budgets presented by the state’s 1% cap on levy revenues. The complicated restriction limits the total revenue collected in property tax to 1% annually leaving local governments scrambling to keep up with inflation.

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