Housing Element Tackled - Nearly Completed

SWAN VALLEY - The Housing Element, the fourth of seven elements of the Swan Valley Growth Plan, was addressed and edited at the Swan Valley Regional Planning Committee meeting Aug. 16. The committee completed six sections of the element.

The committee discussed the addition to the opening paragraph of the fourth element.

The original wording said that the market price of housing has surpassed the ability of many residents to own or rent. Many communities have established programs to help close the gap which can be important to the economic development and social and economic diversity.

The additional wording read that it is a challenge to provide an adequate supply of affordable housing in rural areas. It also said the goal of affordable housing is in conflict with the stated goals of the plan like the desire for large lot development to protect open spaces and wildlife habitat.

The addition further stated that the county would have to weigh the conflicting proposals on a case-by-case basis.

Committee members Dave Johnson and Diann Ericson took exception to the additions to and the deleting of the original wording. Neither felt that the plan favored large lot development. In response to a question about public comments, Ericson said that there was only one comment referring to the original wording.

The committee voted to retain the original wording with Chair Ken Donovan opposed.

“There are a lot of rambling statements that don’t belong there,” Donovan said.

The committee voted to delete the second opening paragraph because it refers to funding programs that are not available or cost effective to rural communities. They however, retained the final sentence that referred to programs that are available. The sentence was attached to the first opening paragraph.

The committee accepted the first paragraph of the section entitled Existing Housing Stock and Conditions as originally written.

The committee accepted the second paragraph as originally written with the exception of the last sentence. It was not clear because the raw data was not available as to how many houses in the planning area built in mid-1970s had the potential to contain outdated construction materials, lead paint and delayed maintenance to those concerns.

The section entitled Housing Unit Types listed there were 594 single family detached units compared with eight single-family attached homes serving as vacation rental condominiums, two units attached to other structures and 60 mobile homes. The committee accepted edits which eliminated excess verbiage.

The SVRPC voted to accept the first sentence of the Housing Affordability section which reads that the 2017 median value of occupied housing in the 59826 zip code area is $315,000. The remainder of the first paragraph was deleted due to opinions about what economic class dominates the market in the Swan Valley.

The committee agreed to keep the second paragraph of the Housing Affordability section as originally written. The paragraph states that encouraging smaller lots closer to residential and commercial areas provides affordable land to residents and future workforce but alone it will not close the affordability gap. If the smaller lots are designed to be connected to open space or common area in cluster type development, it still adds cost to the lots.

The paragraph further states that residents are willing to accept smaller lots but not at the expense of the rural and “wildland” character. Swan Valley resident and realtor John Keller said that the paragraph really “said it all” about the difficulty to close the affordability gap.

The rest of the section was deleted as the data about income and housing costs is changeable.

“Most of it is hard to verify,” said Donovan. Ericson’s motion to put the remainder of the section in an appendix was not passed because of a two-to-two vote.

The committee deleted the section entitled Closing the Affordability Gap. The committee agreed that the information in the original wording about financial help to secure land was already included in the plan or was not applicable to the Swan Valley.

In the Building for Lease or Rent section, the committee voted to accept the edits with Ericson opposed. The committee agreed with member Sara Halm who said the edits are current with codes and laws for health and safety. Ericson was in favor of the original wording because she thought that the information contained in the section would be helpful to property owners and those who want to lease or rent.

The final section addressed was entitled Section 31. The SVRPC voted to delete the reference to the land across from the Swan Valley Community Hall owned by The Nature Conservancy.

Johnson was opposed. He said he believed that the land could be used for workforce affordable housing. He said, “It may be the future of the whole community.”

However, Johnson agreed with Donovan that it was better to keep it out of the draft plan.

“It is not really a subject for the plan to run with,” Johnson said.

The SVRPC will start with the final section, Goals, Policies and Actions of the Housing Element at their next meeting Sept. 13, 7 p.m. at the Swan Valley Community Hall.