Why a Housing Consortium?

A housing consortium is a collaborative effort to address the complex issue of housing availability in our community. The Skagit Housing Consortium is a new organization based in Skagit County, Washington, dedicated to ensuring everyone has access to quality housing they can afford by encouraging all governments, non-profits, private businesses, tribes, religious organizations, and community members to collaborate and support the increase of available quality housing for everyone across all income levels. By pooling our resources, building local capacity, coordinating regulations, and engaging in educational forums to encourage participation from the community, we can make it easier for everyone in Skagit County to find and keep a home they can be proud of.

See below how we intend to achieve our mission and vision with our 2023 plan.

In 2023, the Skagit Housing Consortium will achieve our Mission and Vision by…

  • ● Finalize fiscal sponsorship with EDASC by January 31, 2023

    ● Gain Federal non-profit status by December 31, 2023

    ● Prepare and adopt focused work plan by 1/31/2023

    ● Prepare and adopt budget and financial statement framework by 1/31/2023

    ● Launch membership process by 1/31/2023

    ● Evaluate effectiveness of membership process by 6/30/2023

    ● Develop a public website to communicate SHC work, work plan metrics and accomplishments.

    ● Develop a dashboard to communicate work plan metrics and accomplishment.

  • ● At least 4 education sessions a year including but not limited to the following subject areas:

    ○ The connection between housing supply and homelessness

    ○ Common values around Skagit County’s housing needs and how the community can support housing solutions

    ○ Housing development across the market spectrum

    ○ State legislation and capital budgets

    ○ Funding opportunities and project development

    ○ Local housing and land use planning updates

    ● Engage and give voice to under-served and marginalized communities

    ● Build a best practices library to learn from successful projects

    ● Develop a vision for a community education campaign tailored to Skagit County

  • ● Develop a dashboard to share with the community of:

    ○ Multi-family housing projects in development

    ○ Proposed multi-family housing projects

    ○ Quantity of housing units needed in Skagit County to meet demand

    ● Complete housing inventory of local housing projects current and underway

    ● Create comprehensive list of funding resources (funders, due dates, applications, etc.)

    ● Create year-end report on consortium efficacy and results (possible white paper that evaluates intention vs. outcome or delivery) including projects supported by Consortium

  • ● Support the delivery of public funding opportunities in a coordinated fashion across the county

    ● Develop a consortium public policy agenda that addresses housing barriers across the housing spectrum

    ● Identify and clarify the reasons why Skagit has the lowest vacancy of any county in the state of WA.

    ● Incorporate minority, marginalized, vulnerable and isolated communities in an equitable assessment, for example farmworkers

  • ● Support in pre pre-development of new housing.

    ● Identify two or more new projects that SHC will support.

    ● Supporting the collaboration of information for County/City projects.

    ● Identify and attract local, state, federal and private funding sources to meet our housing development goals