Is there a path from renting to owning?

Yes. Hello. My name is Daniel LeRoy. I am the Director of Government Affairs with Habitat for Humanity Spokane. Today, I just want to make sure that as the preferred alternative is discussed, we include permanently affordable home ownership as a critical connective housing element to keep in consideration as we plan for future growth. We are seeing a rapidly widening gap between the cost of rental housing and traditional home ownership housing. That is why, as the city plans to grow, it is imperative that housing typologies that come out of this process are ownership ready. Whether this is middle housing, condos, special care, thought, and attention need to go into this planning process to make sure that the resulting units are just as usable for ownership as they are for rental. Over the past 40 years, Habitat Spokane has built affordable home ownership opportunities for the Spokane area residents making under 80% of the area median income.More recently, we have introduced the use of land trusts and shared equity models to our program, making sure that all the units that we build are permanently affordable for generations to come. This sort of affordable homeownership program serves to fill a gap between renting and market rate homeownership. And this is a gap that is increasingly out of reach for working Spokane families, and serves as one of the only stepping stones between these two market segments. We realize that in order to serve as many Spokane residents as possible, we need to advocate for the use of diverse housing typologies to maximize the efficiency on very expensive land. This moment matters because this is where the policy direction is being set. The decisions made in this plan will shape what is possible for future code updates. If affordable homeownership is not clearly embedded here, it becomes significantly harder to achieve later. There's also a real opportunity here. Middle housing types like townhomes, cottage housing, and stacked flats are not just about density, they are also one of the most effective ways to deliver ownership at a price point that is attainable, especially when paired with land trust and shared equity models. But that only happens if the policy framework is intentional about supporting them as ownership opportunities. If the city gets this right, we can create a system where more families move from renting into stable, affordable homeownership. And this really mitigates displacement and other affordability concerns moving into the future. So as staff and the commission build out the preferred alternative, we ask that you ensure that future land use code updates enable forms that are feasible for shared equity and land trust ownership, and that the commission recognizes the role of nonprofit developers in delivering permanently affordable homeownership at scale. This is an opportunity to build a more complete housing system, one that increases supply, but also creates real attainable pathways into homeownership for households who need it the most. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you. Next we have Kevin Campbell.