I appreciate the story on Bishop Curry’s visit. I watched the video of his speech and it was impressive for its passion and connection with the local community. And I appreciate the work being done by Chaplains on the Harbor and everyone in Aberdeen.

Would you be interested in more data about housing funding in the state of Washington?

Over the last 10 years, Grays Harbor County has received exactly zero dollars from the state’s Housing Trust Fund. That’s right, Zero. 

Meanwhile, King County over the same period, the Housing Trust Fund (HTF) has funded 89 projects with $130,038,755. The total development costs for those projects is $1,194,870,097.52, that built a total of 4,300 units. King County built 39 percent of HTF units in the state during that period at an average cost per unit of $277,876.77.  King County received about 31 percent of the HTF over that period.

It is true that King County is the biggest county and has about 30 percent of the state’s population. But King County has a poverty rate of 10.70 percent while Grays Harbor County has a poverty rate of 16.6 percent. And income and wages are lower in Grays Harbor County, with a person in that county who earns 60 percent of Area Median Income (AMI) taking home about $14.00 per hour compared to a similar worker in King County who earns about $24.50 an hour, ten dollars more an hour.

But aren’t rents less expensive in Grays Harbor County? Consider that in Aberdeen over the last decade, 1 unit of housing has produced for 11.6 residents in Aberdeen compared to 2.7 units in Seattle. Housing is scarce in Aberdeen, that’s why people are struggling to find it and pay for it. Housing is scarce in rural Washington.

Consider too that more than 22 percent of Grays Harbor County’s population needs basic food assistance compared to around 8 percent in King County. And, the housing stock is older in Grays Harbor County, with more than 65 percent of the housing built before 1980 when standards to reduce lead paint and asbestos were implemented. In King County, that number is about 53 percent.

Finally, housing costs a lot less to build in rural Washington. In peninsula and southwest Washington counties that did get funds to build housing, the average cost of building in a unit in the 10 peninsula and southwest Washington counties was $198,404.07 while in Seattle one recent project cost $500,000 per unit. Based on recent data we disclosed from the state, the cost per unit is approaching an average of $400,000 a unit.

So why would a group called Seattle For Growth be so concerned about housing in Grays Harbor County? We’ve seen the rapid growth of costs in Seattle for all housing, both market rate and non-profit housing. We need better housing policy here. But we’re not getting that. Instead, local non-profits are flexing their political muscle for more and more revenue, including taxing market rate builders.

We think the current system is subsidizing bad housing policies in Seattle at the expense of people in rural Washington, policies that hurt poor people here too by boosting the price of housing. It’s time to change that! So we’re working on a proposal to change the allocation of HTF resources to a block grant model based on need. That would mean Grays Harbor and all counties would get funds based on things like poverty, housing scarcity, and other measures of need rather than on ability to assemble capital.

As a Christian and an Episcopalian I appreciated Bishop Curry’s reference to the mustard seed. My favorite passage in the Gospel of Mark is when Jesus tells this parable and then tells his disciples that he speaks this way to the locals because that’s what they will understand, but to them, he tells them exactly how it is. It isn’t much longer that they are in a storm on a boat, and they are afraid for their lives. “What about us Jesus? Won’t you save us?”

Jesus stops the storm with a command. He gives them what they want. But the story ends with the disciples, the ones Jesus was most honest with being even more afraid, and asking “Who is this man that even winds and sea obey him?”

In Mark, it is a parable, the plain truth, and disciples, those most close in time and space to Jesus himself, still not understanding even though he told them the truth.

Data can be the same way. Confusing. Confounded and confounding. But the truth is in plain site. We need more housing of all kinds, in all parts of the state, for people of all levels of income. It might be hard to see in the numbers, but it is there. But often we wait, until those seeds in the data become the unmanageable and overgrown bushy weed of housing need without supply.

I’d love to head out to your community to hear more about this problem and how we can work together to get more resources to Grays Harbor and other counties who need help with housing. I want to listen to you. I’ve attached some numbers and our evolving proposal to reform the Housing Trust Fund.  We’d like your thoughts.