Commit to more affordable homes

Glimmers of hope on Oahu’s affordable housing scene have emerged recently, with several projects receiving — or about to receive — the green light to build. But that forward progress is tempered by a stark broader picture that shows overwhelming demand still dwarfing the numbers of actual supply.

The City Council last week approved two projects for the Ala Moana area:

>> The SamKoo Pacific LLC Kapiolani Residence condominium across from the old Pan Am Building, in which 292 units, or 60 percent, will be priced in the needed workforce housing category, for those earning up to 120 percent of Oahu’s area median income (AMI) ($80,520 for a single person and $114,960 for a family of four);

>> Stanford Carr Development’s 11-story rental project on Piikoi and Kona streets, where all 128 units will be priced for those earning 30 to 60 percent of median income, a welcome price point.

But these units won’t come cheap, literally and figuratively, given some generous governmental concessions. Exemptions for the 400-foot-tall SamKoo project, for instance, will cost the city more than $15 million in waived fees, including elimination of a $14.3 million park dedication fee that the city Department of Planning and Permitting rightly questioned. Carr’s Piikoi rental project will be helped by deferral of sewer hookup fees, as well as the free site it was deeded by Alexander & Baldwin to fulfill the latter’s affordable-housing obligation in Kakaako.

More encouraging news came Monday, with the city striking a development deal with Michaels Development Co. for two mid-rise towers in Chinatown for at least 151 senior rental units. The Halewai‘olu Senior Residences is planned at an ideal spot for those 62 years and older — with proximity to open markets and central to bus transit — and it was heartening to hear that a majority of units would be for incomes at 60 percent of Oahu’s AMI ($40,260 for a single person), with prices capped for incomes at 80 percent of AMI ($53,700 for singles). City Council approval is urged here.

Developers contemplating affordable housing routinely lament the difficulties of cobbling together a financing plan to ensure that projects — urgently needed though they are — pencil out. For example, Michaels’ $49 million Chinatown development is relying on significant subsidies or low-income loan programs, such as the federal Low Income Housing Tax Credit Equity and the state Rental Housing Trust Fund (RHTF).

The RHTF program, for one, must get renewed attention from Gov. David Ige’s administration and state lawmakers when the 2016 Legislature convenes. It will take aggressive public-private partnerships to make headway on truly affordable housing for Hawaii’s people, and a strong commitment of funds is crucial. Last session, Ige’s proposal for a $100 million capital-improvements infusion for the RHTF was slashed to $40 million. Further, while half of the state’s conveyance tax revenues (taxes paid on land transactions) is supposed to be dedicated to the RHTF, legislators capped that amount at $38 million for fiscal 2016, a wrong-headed move that will stymie needed development of lower-income housing.

Our politicians and leaders must commit the seed money if we are to make headway on permanent affordable housing; otherwise, they are merely enabling a precipice for more residents to fall into homelessness.

Lawmakers need to remember that a 2011 state housing study projected that for 2012-2016, some 19,000 rental units statewide are needed for those earning 30 to 80 percent of median income. The three latest projects in the pipeline — SamKoo’s Kapiolani Residence, Carr’s Piikoi-Kona building and the Halewai‘olu Senior Residences — total just 764. The city’s own tally says fewer than 800 affordable units were built last year, modest but still more than in each of the three years preceding.

Hawaii has a long, long way to go — in housing units and in community will.