Pierce County prefers this site for a big homeless housing project. Why it might not work
Pierce County’s planned microhome village for people experiencing chronic homelessness, recently heralded by county officials as “transformational” and a system “cornerstone,” has struck a development hurdle.
The village featuring 200- and 399-square-foot homes cannot be built on the county’s preferred 86-acre site near wetlands just west of Spanaway unless the zoning there is changed because the proposed project does not fit the current land-use rules, officials say.
The hiccup was discovered this week and only several days after the plan to build 257 so-called microhomes on the site was publicly unveiled Oct. 18 with praise from county officials. It now threatens to hold up funding, delay the site’s purchase and push back timelines for a project anticipated as of last week to see its first subphase completed by late 2024.
“In all honesty, I cannot understand how this happened,” Council Chairman Derek Young said. “That’s a pretty extraordinary miss.”
In November 2021, the County Council authorized allocating up to $500,000 to county Executive Bruce Dammeier’s office to develop the project, including performing site analyses on potential properties and reviewing zoning requirements.
The site’s original review prompted officials to conclude that the project near Spanaway would work with a conditional-use permit, which gives an exception to incompatible developments, Dammeier told The News Tribune. But they now believe that interpretation was wrong and that a code change will be necessary.
The land in question is zoned as “residential resource,” a classification that allows for low-density, single-family homes in open or environmentally sensitive areas. It apparently does not align with the project’s proposed intent of constructing nearly 300 microhomes and resident-volunteer living units; support services, showers and laundry buildings; a visitor’s center; a village commons; and a farmers’ market.
The project would be built on 27 acres of the property.
Still, Dammeier said he did not view the land-use discovery as a significant setback since it was anticipated that the project could change as it moved forward. He added that it was premature to suggest that a workaround allowing the development to proceed would be a lengthy endeavor — although Young said “this isn’t like a quickie code change thing” — nor did Dammeier expect that any major project milestones would be delayed.
“This is a well-developed concept. This is not fully ready to go today,” Dammeier said about the project. “There’s a lot of issues and a lot of process that we have to work through.”
Dollars withheld amid concerns
The Council has gotten behind the village. In interviews with The News Tribune, three lawmakers reaffirmed their strong support for the project’s concept of providing long-unhoused individuals with permanent housing and connecting them to job opportunities and on-site social services. The project, modeled after Community First! Village in Austin, Texas, is planned to be operated by the Tacoma Rescue Mission.
As of July, the county estimated there were roughly 1,600 people experiencing chronic homelessness within its borders.
But County Council members also have worries beyond the zoning issue, including wanting a full accounting for how all costs would be paid, particularly recurring expenses, and ensuring that planned septic systems do not impact the wetlands.
In response to those concerns, the Council decided to delay releasing $22 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds it had conditionally set aside last year for the project, which were expected to be made available in November.
“We’re not going to purchase land that’s fundamentally not able to do what we want to do on it,” Council member Ryan Mello said. “It’s not in the public’s interest to release funds until we have confidence that the details of the project are really thought through.”
The funding is important long-term because it is expected to heavily contribute to the project’s estimated $62.7 million cost, in conjunction with state and private dollars. In the short term, the money would be used to purchase the property in question for $3.7 million on behalf of project developer ASH Development, in a deal that must close before Feb. 1, according to the purchase-and-sale agreement.
Young said the County Council would extend use of the federal pandemic relief aid so they can use it for the project next year. Its approval in late 2021 stipulated that any remaining dollars not authorized to be spent on the project by Jan. 1, 2023, could be spent elsewhere to serve people experiencing chronic homelessness.
Council member Dave Morell, who acknowledged that the zoning issue was disappointing and “caught us a little bit off guard,” said he believed there was a path forward.
“Obviously, it sets back the timeline,” he said.
One option is to rezone the site preferred by county officials — a process Mello said typically takes a minimum of two months or much longer. Another possibility is to take a deeper look into alternative sites that were vetted.
Hope for project’s future
Dammeier remained optimistic that the Council would release funding relatively soon and pass the needed code change to move ahead with the project as proposed, which would be anticipated to be finalized in early 2028. At worst, he said, the purchase-and-sale agreement might need to be extended 15 to 30 days. The village’s public engagement process has only recently started, he noted.
By all accounts, the site near the wetlands — west of the intersection of Spanaway Loop Road and Cross-Base Highway — is the most ideal of any analyzed by county officials due, at least in part, to its remoteness and therapeutic surroundings.
“There’s no doubt in my mind that doing the village at that site — at that property, in conjunction with the environment around it — that it will be a far more conducive place for people who have been subjected to so much trauma to get well, to get healthy,” Dammeier said.
“I just don’t want people to lose sight of what we’re doing here,” he added. “It’s worth all of the effort that we’re going to have to put into it.”
This story was originally published October 27, 2022 at 11:52 AM.
