A group that has already successfully helped one small Seattle project win an exemption from the city’s Mandatory Housing Affordability program fees is helping a Central District family sue over their plans for an addition to their Central District house.

In the new federal lawsuit, the Institute for Justice and Judkins Park couple Anita and Vance Adams are claiming the affordable housing program that requires developments to either include affordable units or pay a fee the city uses to help fund affordable housing projects is unconstitutional and violates the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment.

“[T]he Constitution dictates that governments cannot use the permitting process as an opportunity to coerce money from property owners, and certainly not at the expense of the city’s middle- and low-income residents,” the Institute for Justice writes about the new suit.

The libertarian organization says its mission is “to end widespread abuses of government power and secure the constitutional rights.” It says its work in Seattle will help “clear the way for homeowners to develop their own land without paying exorbitant fees.”

According to the group, the Central District case involves an addition the Adamses hope to build on their Judkins Park property that would result in $75,000 in fees boosted by the MHA requirements.

CHS reported here on the 2019 finalization of the MHA program that included major rezoning and taller building heights in the city’s densest neighborhoods including Capitol Hill and the Central District connected with the new affordable unit and fee requirements. Most developers have opted to pay the fees instead of incorporating the required affordable units and the program has generated millions of dollars to fund city support for low income housing development.

But the Institute for Justice says the program is hurting homeowners and contributing to displacement. “Longtime Central District homeowner Anita Adams knows this firsthand. Anita wants to build a modest addition to house her two adult children,” they write. “But before she can get a building permit, the city demands that she either build additional ‘affordable’ housing units or pay nearly $77,000 into the MHA program. Those fees make Anita’s plans impossible—and leave the city with fewer affordable housing units.”

For the city, it has already faced down past constitutional challenges to MHA. The Institute for Justice, meanwhile, is claiming success with an exemption for homeowners in a similar case in the Highland Park neighborhood.

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