Mayor Carl Florea weighs in on affordable housing legislation

It seems every politician has jumped on the band wagon pushing programs for affordable housing. The legislature just passed a bill allowing local cities to use part of their sales tax receipts to fund affordable housing programs. Senator Maria Cantwell and Representative Suzan DelBene recently introduced a bill in Congress to build millions of affordable housing units across the country.

Leavenworth Mayor Carl Florea campaigned for office on the issue back in 2019 and won election with 55 percent of the vote. Florea then pushed for a measure in the state legislature that would allow the city to put a tax on lodging to be used to subsidize housing in the city. Florea’s plan was built on the concept of the Lodging Tax that places a tax on hotels, motels and bed and breakfasts that currently funds promotion to keep Leavenworth’s tourist economy going strong. That lodging tax generates over two million dollars per year. Florea’s plan was to capture a similar amount to fund subsidized housing that would allow families who work in the tourism industry to be able to afford to live here.

In an interview with Mayor Florea last Friday I asked him how he felt about the recent legislation. The following is his response to my questions:

How do you feel about the new legislation?

The Pandemic delayed action on my tax program. It isn’t what I wanted, but I recognize these things take time. We need to adjust the understanding of what affordable housing means. The problem I see with this legislation is it limits the eligibility for individuals using the program to those who are making 60 percent or less of the average community wage. That limits it to people making less than the minimum wage. From that standpoint it is designed for homeless people not for families. My program is targeted to families working in our tourism industry so they can live here in the community and raise their families here.

According to the Housing Study high home prices are the result of lack of inventory, how does that impact your program?

That is exactly right. We live in a beautiful area with an amazingly beautiful city. We cannot depend on rich people moving in because they can live anywhere, or they just want to retire here. We have a number of contractors that have expressed interest in building lower priced homes. The problem is to get the pricing down where we need it to be for first time home buyers, they can’t make any money on it. I like to think of it as we are missing a rung on the ladder. Traditionally, families buy there first home then as they build equity and their earnings grow they move up. They can’t do that when the first rung is out of reach. That is how most people in this country build their personal wealth.

How much would this new program provide to Leavenworth?

It appears it would produce $250 - $300 thousand per year for the affordable housing program. That is enough that we could probably bond a program to build some housing. The problem remains however that the 60 percent limit on earnings for eligibility isn’t targeting the local employees we are trying to help.