(1) Rents based upon the actual income of a household shall be established so that the household will not expend more than approximately 30% of its annual income on rent and utilities.
(2) Purchase prices based upon the actual income of a household shall be established so that the household will not expend more than approximately 30% of its annual income on mortgage payments, including principal, interest, and property insurance and taxes, home owner association or condominium fees, and utilities.
This November 20, 2024, report by the Office of the Auditor on DC's Inclusionary Zoning program is an indictment of the Smart Growth urbanists who say that building more luxury housing with a required handful of IZ units would be an answer to our unaffordable housing crisis. The numbers in the official report below show quite the opposite.WE NEED AN ALTERNATIVE THAT DECOMODIFIES HOUSING AND AFFIRMS THAT HOUSING IS A HUMAN RIGHT!Part of the IZ failure is because the so-called YIMBY urbanist originators of this groundbreaking aff housing policy chose to never highlight the lack of accountability and enforcement of their developer real estate friends in any of their testimony to the Zoning Commission and to the Council over the years.For more than a decade now, IZ has been used as the soapbox for YIMBYs to cheer on upzoning such as at 1617 U Street. IZ has been the guise for luxury overdevelopment since 2009 and destroyed affordability in the District by setting the definition of “affordable housing” so high as to be out of reach of most working people and families in our city.Resources/Background:
- DC Code § 6–1041, et. seq. Inclusionary Zoning Implementation, https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/titles/6/chapters/10/subchapters/II-A
- DC Zoning Regulations, Chapter 14-22 – INCLUSIONARY ZONING IMPLEMENTATION, https://casetext.com/regulation/district-of-columbia-administrative-code/title-14-housing/chapter-14-22-inclusionary-zoning-implementation
- Inclusionary Zoning (IZ) Affordable Housing Program, DHCD webpage, https://dhcd.dc.gov/service/inclusionary-zoning-iz-affordable-housing-program
- Inclusionary Zoning, DC Office of Planning webpage, https://planning.dc.gov/inclusionaryzoning
Below find my highlights from the Auditor's Report including the two big takeaways showing the dire and acute need for an alternative like social housing:
- 18,000 people on the waitlist for 2000 IZ units!
- Of the 2000 IZ units, 1300 of them are for single individuals (65%).
The Auditor's press release was rosy compared to the actual underlying data, see screenshots of major findings directly from the report:
On Fri, Nov 22, 2024 at 7:48 PM Debby Hanrahan <debbyhanrahan@yahoo.com> wrote:Hello all,The only thing I can say after a quick read of this City Auditor's new report is that the inclusionary zoning (IZ) program is as bad as we have suspected and have witnessed on an anecdotal and individual project basis. The financial abuses of the program were not highlighted, but I hope that will come soon. After you have a chance to read this, I hope you will feel free to walk into your nearest IZ-participating project and ask about subsidized units.Best,Debby—– Forwarded Message —–From: Patterson, Kathy (ODCA) <kathy.patterson@dc.gov>To: Debby Hanrahan <debbyhanrahan@yahoo.com>Sent: Wednesday, November 20, 2024 at 12:56:46 PM ESTSubject: FW: New report: Stronger Oversight Needed for Inclusionary Zoning Program to Reach Housing GoalsJust posted; thanks for your interest!
Kathleen Patterson | D.C. Auditor
she/her/hers
Office of the D.C. Auditor
1331 Pennsylvania Avenue NW 8th Floor
Washington D.C. 20004
Direct: (202) 727-8982 | Office: (202) 727-3600
Website: www.dcauditor.org
From: Shinn, Diane (ODCA) <diane.shinn@dc.gov>
Sent: Wednesday, November 20, 2024 12:48 PM
To: Shinn, Diane (ODCA) <diane.shinn@dc.gov>
Subject: New report: Stronger Oversight Needed for Inclusionary Zoning Program to Reach Housing Goals
Good morning. Attached please find our newest press release and report entitled Stronger DHCD Oversight Needed for Inclusionary Zoning Program to Reach Housing Goals.
Despite a lack of enforcement that has enabled a culture of non-compliance at some of its properties, the District’s Inclusionary Zoning program—
one of the many pathways toward the city’s affordable housing goals—has already implemented or is implementing many recommendations of a new audit published today by the Office of the D.C. Auditor (ODCA).
The IZ program’s purpose is to use market-rate development to increase affordable unit production and ultimately create a full range of long-term housing choices for each District household regardless of size and income. Mayor Muriel Bowser is aiming to achieve the affordable housing goal of producing 12,000 new affordable units for D.C. residents by 2025.
Actions taken by the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) included enforcement action against an IZ provider following a Management Alert issued by ODCA in June.
“We were pleased at the immediate action the agency took earlier this year,” said D.C. Auditor Kathy Patterson. “We are pleased with DHCD’s concurrence with nearly all 17 of ODCA’s recommendations aimed at improving the IZ program’s efficacy, including efforts to meet the 102-day target to fill IZ units from what an ODCA sample found was an average of more than 13 months.”
Findings in the report include that during the audit’s scope DHCD did not:
• Ensure that annual reporting requirements were enforced, which meant they were not able to track which units were vacant or who was living in occupied units.
• Ensure that IZ tenants’ incomes were recertified annually which potentially allowed participants to remain in IZ units for which they were no longer eligible because their income exceeded their units’ income requirement.
• Ensure that properties submitted renewal leases annually. Of the IZ properties in the report’s sample, only one of 16 properties was found to have completed lease renewals in a timely manner. At six of the properties, some renewed leases were found and those, on average, were dated 147 days (five months) after the previous lease’s expiration date. The remaining properties had not renewed any leases at the time of ODCA’s site visits, putting the tenants into a month-to-month status on an expired lease.
• Initiate enforcement action against property owners who violated IZ development covenant requirements and DCMR.
Please let me know if you’d like to speak to the Auditor about this report. Thanks for your interest in ODCA’s work.
Diane Shinn | Director of Communications
Office of the D.C. Auditor
1331 14th Street N.W., Suite 800 South
Washington, DC 20004
Direct: (202) 727-8991 | Office: (202) 727-3600 | Cell: 202-255-6717
she/her/hers
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