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Washington’s Missing Middle Housing Bill Misses the Mark

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Amazon pledged to support affordable housing. How has it fared so far?

Make it One Seattle, full of trees, in Comprehensive Plan

Seattle’s Affordable Housing System is Crumbling, and Roots to Roofs

Phase 2 Zoning is underway

District 1: West Seattle, District 2: Beacon Hill & nearby
District 3: Madison, Madrona, Montlake, Central, District 4: Bryant, Ravenna, Wedgwood District 5: Greenwood, Maple Leaf, Haller Lake, District 6: Ballard, Magnolia, Tangletown, NW Greenlake,District 7: Dravus & Queen Anne

March 19, 2026: Select Committee on Comp Plan

Recorded Meeting, Presentation

Residents asked for “less Vancouver,” where upzoning led to speculative investment and even more expensive housing (third highest after Hong Kong and Sydney, and “more Portland,” where housing prices went down thanks to strategic policy decisions.

Next Select Committee on Comp Plan meetings

  • April 6, 2026, 9:30 a.m. public hearing

  • May 29, 2026, 9:30 a.m. public hearing

  • June 4, 2026, 1:00 p.m.

  • June 18, 2026, 1:00 p.m.

Letter to Mayor Wilson asks for time and space with neighborhoods for planning Seattle’s future (Feb 2026)

Summary of recommendations requesting more planning before passing upzones (1-8), and additional recommendations from SRTG:

  • Articulate a vision for the city’s future development. Past plans that align mobility, green space, and housing production include the original Urban Village Plan and the neighborhood plans it generated, plans for Seattle's HOPE VI neighborhoods, and the Bands of Green plan for urban greenways.

  • Conduct true neighborhood planning to right-size upzones and identify the park developments, transit improvements and other infrastructure needed to accommodate potential population growth. The mayor’s budget contains some money for planning in the areas recommended for the most significant up zones, but more resources will be needed. You can draw on staff from the Department of Neighborhoods, Parks and Recreations, Housing, Transportation and others, or form a sub-cabinet for community development to expand the planning resources available.

  • Identify, protect and expand areas of the city that are working well—what we might call “green zones.” Thanks to the past generation of neighborhood planning, there are many areas of the city in which housing development—including affordable housing—is occurring in balance with green space, transit access, and other civic infrastructure. Replicate those characteristics in other parts of the city.

  • Make early budget adjustments to help more neighborhoods develop the characteristics of green zones. Even in difficult times, the City has tools to support neighborhoods that are striving to add affordable housing, become greener and more equitable. Those tools include the Neighborhood Matching Fund, the Housing Trust Fund, and the Park District funding mechanism among others. Community-based organizations, like the Seattle Parks Foundation and the non-profit housing developers, have long lists of quality projects awaiting funding, and even modest budget adjustments to get some of those projects off the ground quickly would be an important signal of new energy and a new vision at City Hall.

  • Create transformation plans for neglected areas of the city—“gray zones”—where coordinated development of housing, transit, and green infrastructure could have a major impact. Gray zones—such as north Aurora Avenue— will take time and significant resources to redevelop, but they represent a huge future opportunity to transform neglected areas into vibrant neighborhoods. For example, imagine Aurora Avenue as a landscaped boulevard with new housing near the BRT stops, wide tree-lined sidewalks, and nearby parks and playgrounds.

  • Team up with King County Metro and Sound Transit to focus development near current and future transit stations. Within each major transit corridor, there are specific locations where the availability of transit, if coupled with parks and other green infrastructure, could attract or accelerate housing production.

  • Give the Seattle Housing Authority and mission-driven nonprofit developers priority for surplus public land. Land that is no longer needed by public agencies is one of our most valuable tools for shaping equitable growth. The excellent affordable housing developments that have been created on former Sound Transit staging areas demonstrate the power of this practice.

  • Prioritize timely funding for the parks, transit improvements and other essential infrastructure identified through neighborhood planning. Adding density succeeds when it comes with the guarantee of tangible improvements for both new and current residents of the neighborhoods affected. Example: green infrastructure investments prioritized for Park District funding.

    Additional recommendations from SRTG:

  • Review AirBnb policies. Let homes be homes and hotels be hotels. Airbnb policies that allow overnight stays in separate dwellings homes or apartments reduce the housing available to residents. Like other cities, Seattle can impose Airbnb policies that require one week or one month minimums - turn the dial so that we to reach an intentional housing supply growth target.

  • Understand what has changed.

    • The AI boom has generated major layoffs across the Seattle region. Starbucks is investing in growth, but in Tennessee rather than Seattle. Meanwhile, some residents are now facing financial incentives to leave. A city once defined by steady expansion is no longer growing in the same way, and may in places be shrinking.

    • Vancouver and Portland offer important lessons. Vancouver shows how broad upzoning can attract speculative investment, including foreign capital and private equity seeking a safe place to park money. That added demand can push housing prices even higher. Portland, by contrast, created incentives to add housing beyond the single-family model, especially missing-middle options, while also preserving more of the existing neighborhood fabric.

      Note: Vancouver ranks as the third least affordable major housing market in the 2024 Demographia International Housing Affordability report, with a median multiple of 12.3. That means the median home price was 12.3 times the median household income, described as “impossibly unaffordable.” Only Hong Kong (14.4) and Sydney (13.8) ranked worse among the 94 markets studied. Vancouver is listed as the least affordable market in Canada.

Seattle Residents for Thoughtful Growth
LETTER TO COUNCIL - AUGUST 13, 2025

Dear Councilmembers,

Seattle Residents for Thoughtful Growth, representing residents from 22 neighborhoods, is deeply concerned about the direction and cumulative impact of several proposed amendments to the Comprehensive Plan and CB120985/CB120993. We support increased density focused on affordable middle housing.While some amendments are beneficial (like 110 for notice), others, as shown below, risk accelerating the loss of naturally affordable housing. In its place will come high-priced development that displaces renters and pushes out homeowners through rising property taxes and decreased livability.

CB 120993, intended to advance middle housing affordability, has instead been drafted in such a way that makes tall, detached, single-family homes the “highest and best use” of land[1]. Instead of removing this outcome from the playbook, many current amendments attempt to patch the problem with incentives—an effort that fails to address the underlying issue. The resulting outcomes will be even more damaging to Seattle’s current and future residents.

These changes will not produce the housing Seattle needs. They will fuel maximum buildout of market-rate units, often targeting the very places where lower-cost homes, more affordable rental units, and sensitive environmental areas exist. The likely outcome: displacement, tree canopy loss, and commercial shifts that erode both diversity and livability. Don’t let this be your legacy. We can fix this and meet Seattle’s needs with affordable middle housing and developer opportunities in the upzoned areas. You can always upzone more – but pavement is forever.

The most damaging amendments include:

  • Middle-housing “bonuses” that overbuild (various amendments): FAR, setbacks, height, and lot coverage bonuses for middle housing are unnecessary in a bill already designed to enable it. Without limits—such as prohibiting lot subdivision below 2,500 sq ft while still allowing fee-simple ownership—these incentives simply encourage maximum lot coverage at the expense of tree canopy, green space, privacy and sunlight; and will result in buildings out of scale with existing homes. Let’s keep the tall, cubed-out buildings where they belong: in the LR+ zones, and reserve NR for affordable middle housing.

  • Inflated height limits (Amendments 74, 78, 91, 93): Allows 40–47 feet (incl. roof) in Neighborhood Residential zones and pushes lowrise zones higher still, inviting bulkier, more expensive construction that displaces smaller, more affordable homes and existing middle housing, often for no increase in density.

  • Removal of parking requirements (Amendments 7, 84, 85, 86): Eliminates parking citywide, even for institutions and businesses, pushing parking burdens into surrounding neighborhoods and reducing the viability of family-sized housing in a city with limited public transit.

  • Environmentally Critical Area buildout (Amendment 72): Counts designated non-disturbance areas in steep slopes, wetlands and riparian zones toward density calculations, incentivizing development in hazardous and environmentally sensitive areas.

  • ADU deregulation (Amendments 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59): Turns ADUs into effectively free additional primary units—making them larger, subdividable, and exempt from FAR, density calculations, and Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) requirements. This fuels lot-buildout without delivering affordability.

  • Conflating Transit Routes (Amendments 60, 61, 76): Extending development entitlements intended for BRT and Light Rail facilities or frequent transit undermines the land-use goal of creating localized zones of density near appropriate transit.

We urge you to consider these amendments as a whole, not in isolation. Their combined effects could permanently negatively alter housing affordability and the livability of Seattle’s neighborhoods. We encourage you to pause on adopting CB120993 unit we can work together to turn it into an effective middle housing bill. We would like the opportunity to present our analysis and case studies to Council to ensure you are receiving a full picture of the likely outcomes. Let’s make sure CB120993 enables and encourages the housing we actually need while preserving what residents cherish about our city. Since we have interim legislation complying with state law, and CB120993 has dramatic impacts to every residential parcel in Seattle, let’s collaborate to make it work for Seattle’s current and future residents - not just serve developers.

Notes:

[1] This shift from a middle housing bill to single family housing accelerator did not happen by accident. On April 16, 2025, official slides about HB1110’s implementation via CB120969 presented to the public solely depicted multi-family dwellings, reflecting the bill’s stated intent to encourage diverse housing types (see image).

Then on June 11, 2025 the CB 120993 - Central Staff Memo language had been altered to describe detached single-family dwellings—an irreversible change that redefined the post-CB120993 “highest and best use” for Seattle’s NR zoned lots. This was a turning point that fundamentally and quietly changed the bill’s direction and purpose, creating a path for luxury detached home construction (on small subdivided parcels) under the guise of middle housing reform.

State Mandate: Build Middle Housing,
not Single Family Homes and Tower-hoods

HB1110 defines Middle Housing as: “compatible in scale, form, and character with single-family houses and contain two or more attached, stacked, or clustered homes including duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, fiveplexes, sixplexes, townhouses, stacked flats, courtyard apartments, and cottage housing.” Source: HB1110, lines 32 - 35

What is not Middle Housing? Detached single-family “tower homes” and oversized attached units over 1,250 square feet do not align with the spirit or intent of Middle Housing. When developers replace older, modestly priced homes with luxury units—especially tall, bulky tower homes—they eliminate existing Middle Housing, erase tree canopy, and drive up land values. These projects often attract wealthier buyers relocating from other cities, while long-time residents seeking attainable housing are left with even fewer options.

If we continue down this path, we risk accelerating the destruction of true Middle Housing—ironically, under the banner of creating it.

Over 23 Seattle organizations and neighborhood groups agree: Seattle can do better. The City’s HB1110 Permanent Legislation, which applies to every single-family lot in the city, unnecessarily shrinks setbacks, raises roof heights, and expands lot coverage—changes that will fast-track demolition and large-scale redevelopment across neighborhoods – to the benefit of developers and investors and to the detriment of affordable Middle Housing, current residents, and the environment. There are many examples of middle housing in Seattle today that respect the scale, character, and tree canopies of their neighborhoods – the true intent of HB1110. Let’s do more of that!

Capitol Hill | Central District | Columbia City | Green Lake | Greenwood | Haller Lake | Madison Park | Madrona |
Magnolia | Maple Leaf | Montlake | Mt Baker | Phinney Ridge | Queen Anne | Tangletown | Wallingford |
Washington Park | Wedgwood |West Seattle – Fauntleroy | West Seattle - Seaview/Fairmount | Whittier Heights

TAKE ACTION TODAY

  • Write to your Council Member (email list here), as well as at-large Council Members.

RESOURCES

Background

This summer, the City Council is prioritizing major decisions on future growth citywide. A significant focus is on passing CB120993, legislation to comply with the state mandate (HB1110) allowing 4-6 units per lot across the city. This will substantially increase housing capacity and density. Between June and September, the Council will review, debate, and legislate the Comprehensive Plan CB120985, featuring new policies and Future Land Use Maps. Rezoning and converting all single-family lots to multi-family is the objective of Phase 1. The Full Council and Select Committee Meetings will primarily focus on HB1110 and the Comprehensive Plan legislation, aiming for a final vote in September. Council will shift to budget work in October-November, resuming Comprehensive Plan Phase II in Dec-January.