Affordable housing is in short supply around Idaho

Affordable housing is an issue in many U.S. cities, but it can be even more acute in areas considered “resorts.” Idaho is no exception.

In Idaho cities, more than half of renters with incomes between $15,000 and $30,000 annually are considered “cost burdened,” spending more than 30 percent of their income on housing, said Corey Cook, dean of Boise State University’s School of Public Service, citing figures from the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies. For renters with incomes less than $15,000, it’s worse: from 70 percent to more than 90 percent are cost-burdened.

Boise is trying to tackle the issue. A 2015 study found Boise had a deficit of 5724 and 2371 units for extremely low income and low income people, respectively. But unlike most cities, Boise has a stock of some 300 affordable housing units throughout the city that it acquired about two decades ago through community development block grants.

“It was pretty forward-thinking at the time,” said AnaMarie Guiles, housing and community development manager. The city’s housing strategy is intended to reduce homelessness.

Affordable housing is even more critical in Idaho’s resort cities, where high land prices make it difficult for developers to make workforce housing to pencil out, even if they wanted to. Consequently, service workers who support those communities, as well as public sector employees like teachers, firefighters, and police officers, have trouble finding a place to live, and end up commuting from outside. In an emergency or severe weather, the very people the region depends on could be cut off.

Nowhere is the problem more acute than in Sun Valley, where the lack of affordable multifamily housing has made it difficult to both attract and retain companies, said Harry Griffith, executive director of Sun Valley Economic Development, which serves Blaine County. “The No. 1 concern of any company considering relocating here is housing for their employees,” he said. “There are some companies that have said ‘It would be great, but there’s no way we can make it work.’ People turn down jobs because they can’t afford to live here.” Hailey is considering changing its zoning to allow “micro apartments,” he said.

Even cities not considered “resort communities” can find it hard to develop workforce housing. Moscow created a local Community Housing Development Organization called the Moscow Affordable Housing Trust, said Bill Belknap, community development director. Moscow also provides a density

bonus within Planned Unit Developments for including affordable housing, and changed code recently to allow accessory dwelling units (“granny flats”) and twinhomes, which are like duplexes but without shared lot ownership. Other efforts are underway in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho Falls, and McCall.

Aside from land costs, developing affordable multiunit housing typically requires funding, which primarily comes from the federal government through population-based Low-Income Housing Tax Credits. “The resources that are necessary to do the housing are not infinite,” said Tom Mannschreck, president and CEO of Thomas Development Co. in Boise, which has built several affordable multiunit developments in Idaho over the past few years. “The demand in almost all areas exceeds the supply.” Concerns about federal income tax reform, as well as rising construction costs, make it harder for these transactions to work economically than a year ago, he said.

That said, Mannschreck has several projects planned for the next few months: a 36-unit senior affordable property in Lewiston, a 48-unit senior apartment complex in Eagle, 166 units of family affordable apartments in Boise, and a 40-unit permanent supportive housing facility in Boise that is intended to provide both housing and social support services, he said.

Of the affordable multi-unit housing that is being developed, most of it is due to the Idaho Housing and Finance Authority, or IHFA, which administers LIHTC in Idaho. LIHTC amounts to about $3 million of credit per year over ten years, which produces about 300 rental units each year, said Gerald Hunter, president and executive director of the Boise-based organization. And even with the new presidential administration, he doesn’t expect the program to go away, noting that not only does it receive bipartisan support, but the Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act of 2016, if it passes, would increase funding by 50 percent over five years.

IHFA also uses tax-exempt bonds to create and finance affordable housing, Hunter said. Altogether, IHFA has been responsible for about 30 properties, for a total of approximately 1600 units, over the past three years, he said.

On the state level, the Idaho Legislature created the Idaho State Housing Trust Fund in 1992, but is one of only four states that never put any money in it, said Wyatt Schroeder, executive director of Charitable Assistance to the Community’s Homeless (CATCH), a Treasure Valley nonprofit. “What we need is a true commitment among community leaders that housing is a problem worth prioritizing,” he said.