Friends and neighbors
Last session, the legislature made significant progress on increasing housing supply by expanding the use of familiar housing options like duplexes and townhomes (House Bill 1110 and House Bill 1337). The House and Senate also invested a record $400 million into affordable housing through the Housing Trust Fund in the 2023 Capital Budget and an additional $127.5 million in the 2024 supplemental budget.
(Photo Credit – LSS Photograph)
This session, House and Senate Democrats continued to expand our ability to increase housing supply by accelerating the construction of affordable workforce housing (House Bill 1892), preventing common-interest communities from imposing arbitrary occupancy limits (House Bill 1054), paving the way for co-living housing (House Bill 1998), and expanding protections for mobile home park tenants (Senate Bill 6059).
There is still more work to be done. Legislation to stabilize rent increases (House Bill 2114), increase development near transit (House Bill 2160), and establish a statewide department of housing (House Bill 2270) came up short of the governor’s desk. These bills are critical in addressing our housing affordability crisis and will likely be revisited in future sessions.
Election Year Restrictions
During an election year, there are certain restrictions on my communications to prevent the use of state resources for election purposes. Some of these restrictions include freezes on email updates, websites, and Facebook pages. This means that you will not be receiving updates from me beginning May 6, 2024, until after the general election in November. That is why this will be the last email update you’ll receive from me for a while. However, you can still reach out to my office with questions, requests for meetings, or to deliver messages to me.
In the meantime, have a great fall and summer and I will talk to you again soon.
Thanks again,
Rep. Strom Peterson