In an announcement Wednesday, Gov. Jay Inslee said he is committed to raising $4 billion over six years to address the state’s ongoing homelessness crisis by asking voters to approve a referendum that would allow the state to issue bonds outside of Washington’s debt limit.
State Sen. Lynda Wilson, R-Vancouver, said throwing more money at the problem isn’t working. Wilson, who is the ranking member on the Senate Ways and Means committee, said the state needs to address the root causes of homelessness instead.
“We’re dumping billions in money into this problem for years, and not only are our numbers going up, but they’re going up faster than most other states,” Wilson said by phone Wednesday. “You have to wonder why that’s happening.”
One of those causes, Wilson said, is the skyrocketing costs of building new housing which has only been made more expensive by costly and unnecessary state building requirements.
“Just recently, the building council banned natural gas to heat your home or water in residential homes,” Wilson said. “We know that costs more money.”
She said there are other requirements, like installing an electric vehicle charger or wiring for solar panels, that are contributing to rising home prices.
Another cause not being addressed is drug dependence, Wilson said. She said many tiny home projects don’t have requirements, such as being in a treatment program or being drug-free, and that isn’t helping to solve the homelessness crisis.
“There’s nothing there that’s going to make them better, for them to be able to fix their lives and become productive members of society, which is what we all want,” Wilson said.
Because the additional $4 billion in funding, if approved, would go to the capital budget, Inslee said his plan would provide for additional housing units to be built — around 5,300 between 2023 and 2025 and 19,000 in the following six years.
Inslee also called on legislators to address the need for more land for affordable housing developments, especially higher-density housing along travel corridors.
While state Rep. Monica Stonier, D-Vancouver, said she hadn’t read the governor’s budget in full and wanted to understand the strategy fully before voicing support for it, she said “every tool should be available to consider.”
“Democrats got a lot of heat, and will continue to get a lot of heat, from the other side about not returning the funds we have in our surplus … to taxpayers,” Stonier said in a phone interview Wednesday. “But what that does when we have a healthy reserve is lower our costs of bonding. This wouldn’t even be an option if we were not careful to make sure we had healthy reserves.”
Stonier, who sits on the House Appropriations committee, said she spent the day meeting with Vancouver Mayor Anne McEnerny-Ogle, Mayor Pro Tem Ty Stober and her fellow legislators and said addressing housing and homelessness remains a critical issue for everyone.
“The House just reorganized our committee structure to have a single committee focused 100 percent on housing,” Stonier said. “We know we’re going to put a lot of our time and resources this session into addressing that.”
