At last, a plan to develop more affordable rentals has emerged that could be equal to the task policymakers face.
At the very least, the 159-page document represents a credible assessment of the mountain they will have to climb in order to close a yawning gap in housing supply and demand.
Two years ago, lawmakers passed Senate Bill 2561, Act 127 upon Gov. David Ige’s signature. It created a Special Action Team of stakeholders to make recommendations for solutions to the chronic housing shortage, which overall amounts to 64,700 units Hawaii needs to add by 2025.
This was the essence of the “Affordable Rental Housing Report and 10-Year Plan.” Its message is that reducing Hawaii’s housing shortage will require not only sustained funding, but a coordinated push for regulatory reforms across state and county jurisdictional lines.
It spelled out the need for rentals aimed at households of all incomes, but most urgently for those earning 80 percent of area median income, or less. And it set a goal of “developing or vesting the development of at least 22,500 affordable rental housing units ready for occupancy” by the end of 2026.
That is only eight years away — incredibly soon. Most discouraging was that, while the team was working away at the project, the state made too little headway, with lawmakers foregoing proposals to make significant fiscal commitments toward resolving the problem.
And even with the boldest moves of last session — including an infusion of $200 million for financing new affordable rental housing, as well as other productive efforts to strengthen development incentives — there were failures to remove other barriers to affordable-rental delivery.
For example, according to the report, House Bill 2358, which stalled in committee, would have accelerated the Hawaii Public Housing Authority’s own 10-year plan by keeping lands dedicated for public housing within the agency’s jurisdiction, rather than under the purview of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources.
This sounds like bureaucrat-ese, but such little fixes can really matter; the failure may delay the redevelopment of crucially needed units. Lawmakers need to take all such steps that will advance the goal.
The report’s authors also are pressing legislators to re-introduce a bill to lift a $38 million cap on the allotment of real estate conveyance taxes that go to the Rental Housing Revolving Fund, a cache that supplies developers of affordable units with interim financing.
Keeping the pipeline open with loans and grants for these projects is essential, as assembling needed financing is complex and often can hang up a development for long periods.
Wisely, the report recommends that state planners abandon tunnel vision when it comes to the use of public property for housing. Vacant state or county lands are sometimes undeveloped for a reason — the difficulty of building in that area, for instance.
It’s time for Hawaii’s leaders to examine more seriously all of its redevelopment options, taking a clear-eyed look at properties now in use and reconsider. Could that use be managed elsewhere, or folded with a housing project? And could land trusts, land banking and other strategies be better used to hold property for housing purposes?
Making more effective use of public land is listed as one avenue for change. Some of the others:
>> Boost infrastructure by leveraging private and government funding sources to increase capacity in the urban core and in growth areas.
>> Consider a unified affordable-
housing approval process to cut red tape in review by both city and state agencies.
>> Explore the cost-effectiveness of acquisition and rehabilitation of existing units, in comparison with new construction.
And the state should ramp up the repurposing of structures — anything from excess school space to private partnerships for converting vacant commercial complexes to residential units. The Hawaii Housing Finance and Development Corp. alliance with Queen Emma Partners over the abandoned Queen Emma Building is a promising example of the latter.
There are bright spots that illuminate the dreary landscape of Hawaii’s rental shortage. The launch of an experimental “micro-housing” tower in Kakaako is one; so is the groundbreaking for a long-delayed project comprising 320 affordable rentals.
But anecdotal advances don’t erase the startling statistics. Here’s one: The Hawaii Housing Planning Study tallied 51,120 units in the Hawaii housing stock that in 2015 were vacant, but not available to the state’s residents. Most of these were held for seasonal or occasional use, a 9 percent increase since 2010.
It’s helpful, if daunting, to see the impact of the vacation rental market, legal or otherwise, spelled out in such stark terms.
Resolving this crisis will take sustained funding, to be sure, but money isn’t the only deficit. Solutions will take cooperation and political will, something else that’s also in short supply.
