What is HALA?
The Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda (HALA) is a multi-pronged strategy for addressing housing affordability in Seattle.
HALA Summary: English // 普通话 // 한국어 // Spañish // Af-Soomaali // Tagalog // Tiếng Việt
Dashboard of all 65 HALA Strategies and City Council Work Plan
HALA Strategies:
Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA)
More Resources for Affordable Housing
Preservation, Equity, & Anti-Displacement
HALA History
In September 2014, the Mayor's Office and the City Council gathered leaders in our community to help develop a bold agenda for increasing the affordability and availability of housing in our city by convening a Housing Affordability and Livability Advisory Committee. The 28-member stakeholder group included renters and homeowners, for-profit and non-profit developers, and other local housing experts. After months of deliberation, they reached consensus and published a report with 65 recommendations to consider. Since then, the City and its partners have begun implementing the HALA recommendations, including doubling Seattle's Housing Levy with nearly 70% voter support and strengthening legal protections for renters. Together we are striving to put even more HALA actions into effect.
Among those actions is Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA), a program that requires developers to either build a certain number of affordable homes within their projects or make a one-time payment into an affordable housing fund. The framework for this legislation was established in a statement of intent cosigned by a diverse group of stakeholders and it paved the way for the MHA Commercial Framework ordinance, the MHA Residential Framework ordinance and finally the future zoning legislation to implement MHA. Currently, MHA is in effect in five areas of the city.