Developers and Spokane city leaders this week unveiled new affordable housing that comes with 210 units for essential workers, including retail workers, first-responders and teachers. It’s called Kōz on West 5th and is the largest project to use Washington state’s Parking to People incentive so far, according to Kōz Development.
“The adoption of the [Parking to People] program through the state of Washington was critical to making the numbers work for this project. We would not be here today if the city had not embraced [Parking to People],” said Kōz Development President Cathy Reines.
That incentive means the new building sits on a former, empty surface parking lot. That’s the goal behind this sales and use tax deferral program. It turns parking lots that were used on or before June of 2022 into housing, creating new chances for people living in the city.
Creating new housing does more for the city in the long run, said Spokane Planning Director Spencer Gardner.
“If you bring up Google Maps and look at this property on the satellite… what you’ll see is a dirt lot with a couple of cars parked on it. What does that dirt lot do for the city? Very little. In fact, it’s probably a net negative because that can attract bad uses and things,” he said.
Councilmember Zach Zappone supports the legislation and helped push it forward back in 2023.
“One thing that we hear as elected officials is affordable housing. And there’s a great debate about what’s affordable and what’s not affordable,” he said.
To apply for the “Parking to People” initiative, the state requires half of the housing in the project to be at 80% area median income [AMI] or below.
“This is 100% of the units at 80% of the area median income or below. So this is going above and beyond the requirements,” he said.
Zappone hopes to see more projects like this in the future, he said. People have already started moving into Kōz on West 5th.
