SANDPOINT — The state Land Use and Housing Study Committee met in the Sandpoint City Council chambers to hear and discuss potential solutions to the affordable housing crisis in Idaho.

This was the third meeting of the special committee and focused on groups from North Idaho pitching their ideas and local solutions they’ve done to help create more affordable housing. The meeting was the last of the “information gathering” phase of the committee, which will now break into four work groups to help tackle individual parts of the crisis for the upcoming Idaho legislative session. 

"I think it was very successful,” Jim Woodward, State Senator and co-Chair of the committee said. “With all those morning presentations we got some really good input from different approaches that have been taken to put affordable housing on the market, making sure that the people who are working in the area can afford to stay in there.” 

The four work groups are focused on infrastructure, permitting and the Land Use Planning Act, zoning modernization and housing incentives and financing. Woodward and Sandpoint Mayor Jeremy Grimm joined the subcommittee focused on infrastructure access and funding. 

Woodward said that after the September meeting, the committee will review the recommendations, and his plan is to create a best practices document to help guide local communities on how to increase affordable housing.  

“Let each community decide what’s best for them and support the idea of local control,” Woodward said. “I’m always a fan of local control versus a one-size fits all statewide solution.” 

Among the presenters was Katie Egland Cox, the executive director of the Kaniksu Land Trust. Cox delivered the only presentation to the committee that was focused on Bonner County, walking them through the land trusts and its partners’ efforts to build more affordable housing in Priest River. 

The land trust built six homes in Priest River last May for local households earning below 120% of the area’s median income. Cox said that the land trust hit several snags when trying to implement similar housing developments across the county. 

In her presentation to the committee, Cox suggested possible solutions to allow the land trust to build more affordable housing. These included relief or exemptions from fees for nonprofits, creating a state housing trust bank account and zoning and building code flexibility, like eliminating density caps. 

“It is not the be all, end all for housing issues, but it’s one tool in the toolbox and we have found it to be effective,” Cox said during her presentation. “I look forward to always supporting [our partners] and their work because this is something we need to be the great state of Idaho.”  

Other solutions presented to the committee included a detailed breakdown of fee simple shared equity homes from the Executive Director of the Panhandle Affordable Housing Alliance, Maggie Lyons. The practice uses deed restrictions to maintain the lower cost like the land trust’s effort but allows the buyer to purchase the land and home.  

PAHA created a first of its kind housing development in Post Falls using the fee simple shared equity model and Lyons said that it has been a huge success. The process allows first-time homeowners an opportunity to put down roots and build equity in local communities, which leads to more people being able to buy homes later in life. 

"They are all thrilled to get their foot in the door of homeownership,” Lyons said of the homebuyers. “Initially, relators were not advocates for this work because relators are not involved in this, but the light bulb has gone on for them that they understand we are building their future customers that would not exist without this option."

The committee also heard from the Idaho chapter of the American Planning Assocation, the Housing Solutions Partnership in Coeur d’Alene, Dominium Apartments, a former chair of the Montana Housing Task Force and a representative from the CDA Vacation Rental Alliance.  

Woodward said the committee is necessary because the people being pushed out by high prices are contributing workers that every city needs. 

“[Affordable housing] is a part of a balanced, working community, firefighters, teachers, people working in the trade, all of those people should be able to afford a house,” Woodward said. “That’s a part of the community, owning your own home and the sense of belonging.”