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Ever Onward Podcast
The Ever Onward Podcast is your go-to business podcast, offering engaging discussions and diverse guests covering everything from business strategies to community issues. Join us at the executive table as we bring together industry leaders, experts, and visionaries for insightful conversations that go beyond the boardroom. Whether you're an entrepreneur or simply curious about business, our podcast provides a well-rounded experience, exploring a variety of topics that shape the business landscape and impact communities. Brought to you by Ahlquist.
Ever Onward Podcast
Why Housing Costs Keep Rising in Idaho with Ali Rabe | Ever Onward - Ep. 130
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Housing affordability has become one of the most important issues facing Idaho families, communities, and the state’s future.
In Episode 130 of Ever Onward, Tommy Ahlquist sits down with housing advocate, former Idaho legislator, and Executive Director of Gem State Housing Alliance, Ali Rabe, for a candid conversation about why housing costs keep rising across Idaho—and what can be done about it.
Together, they explore the connection between housing affordability and homelessness, the challenges facing working families, the impact of population growth, local regulations, infrastructure, housing supply, and the policies shaping Idaho’s future. Ali shares lessons from her time in the legislature, her work at Jesse Tree, and her vision for creating more housing opportunities throughout the state.
Whether you’re a homeowner, renter, business leader, policymaker, or simply someone who cares about Idaho’s future, this episode offers valuable insight into one of the biggest challenges facing our communities today.
Topics include:
• Housing affordability in Idaho
• Homelessness prevention and housing stability
• Housing supply and development challenges
• Local zoning and regulatory barriers
• Growth, infrastructure, and community planning
• The future of housing policy in Idaho
Learn more about Gem State Housing Alliance: gemstatehousing.org
#EverOnwardPodcast #IdahoHousing #HousingAffordability #AliRabe #IdahoGrowth #HousingPolicy #GemStateHousingAlliance
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Welcome And Why Housing Matters
Welcome to the Ever Onward Podcast. Today we have a great topic. We're going to talk about housing affordability and homelessness with one of the local experts here in Idaho. Ali Rabe has been part of the Idaho legislature. She's a great representative that has done amazing things there. She's also been at Jesse Tree and understands those people that are experiencing homelessness and the cost of housing here in the Valley. She currently is just starting a new position as the executive director of the Jim State Housing Alliance. This is the state's first pro housing coalition working to expand housing options across the communities. There's never been a more important time to talk about housing affordability on both ends, both on the homelessness end and the affordability end for all working families here in Idaho. She has some tremendous ideas and policy thoughts that are going to be shared today. Really look forward to catching up with Allie and appreciate all that she does. For those of you that are listening to our podcast and enjoying it, please like, share, and give us a review. Today, our guest will be Ali Ray.
Leaving The Legislature For Housing Work
Thank you so much for coming on. You're awesome. Hey, so are you? Thanks for all you do for our community. Yeah. Your um legislative session. Um are you're my last one, yeah. So I just wrapped up my You're not running again. I'm not, yeah. How come? Um in part because I'm starting this new effort and we want to be active at the state level in 2027. Um, and it'll just be easier for me to keep the roles separate in that way. So I'll still be doing housing advocacy at every level of government, um, but can do it um full time now, which was exciting. And then um how many years did you serve? I also have a one-year-old and a three-year-old. So I first got elected in 2020. So you've been it's I've been in there. Yeah, I skipped a year because I moved districts. Yeah, but I've been through five sessions. So I knew your kids were little. You've got one and three. Yep. How on earth did you do that this session? My husband and I are both local and he takes a lot of the burden, and then our moms are at our house pretty much every day, as is my aunt. And oh, I can't I can't even imagine. I'm sister-in-law and I knew they were little, but I didn't know that they were that little. Yeah, they're little, so we're busy at home, but we've got a lot of help. You're probably very glad the session's over. I'm very glad, yes. I didn't I didn't see them for three months really. I mean, that much for three months. So it was tough for them, um, for sure, especially during session, and then every every two years, every legislator has to campaign. Isn't it isn't that's like that that's gotta be part of the thing, whether you're Senate or House, people don't realize that because nationally it's six-year terms and two, but for us it's two, two. So everyone's up for election every two years. Every two years, which is good and bad. Um but a lot of new faces down there. A lot of new faces, and we'll see what the shakeups are in May after May 19th. It'll be interesting. But yeah, it's good it's coming up. I'm excited that uh yeah, this year I just get to help people that and just observe. And yeah, next year I'll be active in a different way. But uh yeah, I'm I'm also felt like you know, I'm I didn't want to be there for 20 years and I want to leave space for new people to come in and bring in their ideas. And I set out when I started to accomplish some things that I felt like I accomplished. Um, I got housing to be a big topic in the legislature. We got, you know, $50 million put into our workforce housing fund a couple years ago for the first time. We got some uh better landlord tenant laws passed. We um there was a lot of housing legislation. I'll be this obviously this year. I established a housing committee that studied the issue last year with some colleagues, and we had five meetings across the state where the legislature was really digging into this problem for the first time. So I felt like I set out what I wanted to do, you know, accomplish what I wanted to do. Yeah, you've been a huge champion of this. And um I think um I think housing affects everyone. It's interesting how
Preventing Homelessness Before It Starts
um some try to make it partisan. Yes, it's part of what I wanted to get into you with today because let's start kind of on the low income side. So um, yeah, as you know, uh you you have been a champion, you've been amazing, you've been fantastic. And and I was on the end family. Campaign to end family homelessness, yeah. Campaign to end family homelessness in Ada County, and a little bit about that, that was a community effort to try to create processes and funding to try to keep just the families out of homelessness. Um, and the the data behind it was really powerful because if someone slips from being homed to homeless, um, the cost to get them re-homed is is is exponentially higher than if you can just figure out a way to keep them in a home long enough to get a problem solved. I also think, you know, I was as a former ER doc, um, you know, I lived in the trenches. So I think the idea, um, the false idea that everyone that's homeless has a drug problem, everyone that's homeless is, you know, kind of this is gonna sound bad, but kind of, you know, they haven't worked hard enough to not be there. It's just complete BS. Um when you're in the trenches and you see because um I always tell the story um when you when you come to the ER and your scene for whatever reason you're there, at the end of it it there's a thing that is a requirement for charting that's called disposition. And as the doctor, you have to say what the disposition was. And I and and it was either disposition admit to the floor, admit to the ICU, or disposition discharged home. And that used to always just hit me because I would write the word home on a chart at the end of every patient visit. And you gotta remember, over my career, I'd calculated once when I was running for government, I like saw like 45,000 people more than that. So 45,000 times I either wrote admit to the hospital or discharge home. And when I was when I was there in the middle of the night, because I did a lot of night shifts, a lot of times I knew I would be saying discharge home, but I wasn't saying home. Right. And it used to just really it hit me at a real raw kind of human level of hey, I just said to this mother and her two kids, I'm discharging you home, knowing that they're gonna go get in their car and they have nowhere to go. Now we had social workers who did a a valiant effort of trying to work um to try to figure something out and try to figure out like immediate resources to try to help. And we have a very giving and caring community. Yes. I think that's the other part of it that gets misconstrued is you have you have wonderful, you like like think of the Boise Rescue Mission, think of the WCA and their shelters, think of all the great things. And so you're not saying that those aren't super effective, it's just they're not enough. Not enough. They're not enough. So maybe a third of the need. A third of the need, right? And so um anyway, I and I think uh and I and it's often it's often the um the republican kind of far right part of the party that will of the politics that'll say, hey, we shouldn't be spending all these dollars on this stuff. People should figure it out. I figured out, my kids figured out, why are we helping people? And then I do think there are a lot of really bad examples of other cities where it's become an industry, and you'll hear that too. Hey, this thing that is government subsidy for homeless people became an industry. So I think they point to those examples and say, look what happened in Portland. Um, there's an entire industry around uh homeless people, and if you look at how much they've spent, this is crazy. Um, that is not what happens here. No. It is it's just like complete insanity to even bring it up as an example. I have so many thoughts to what you're saying. I worked in homelessness in the Bay Area, you know this. I'm from Idaho, but I left for a while about eight years in my 20s to go to school and all these things and um worked in homelessness there. And it is I call it the homeless industrial complex. You know, you have people making six figures to talk about homelessness and push contracts and complicated trainings and how we implement this complicated government bureaucracy that is never asking the question, how do we get out of this situation? And I think part of it is, you know, it's so far gone in some of those cities that I don't know if they can get out of that situation. It's gonna cost billions of dollars because, like you said, um, they're paying billions of dollars to just keep people homeless, clean up the streets, maintain shelters, maintain basic needs for people living outside. And they don't have the opportunity to invest in the situation upstream at this point. And what I why I'm excited about being in Idaho and um just all the opportunities that we have here is that I do believe that we can get ahead of this problem. And the conversation and the question should be how do we not end up like that? Because if we don't do something now, that's why I love you, because you have been articulating that, you and a bunch of other people. I think it says it loud and clear that we are proactively staying ahead of this and we're not creating those systems. And I think you've done an amazing job of it. And it it still gives it makes me nothing makes me more irritated because I'm like, if you if if anybody who critiques or criticizes what's happened here just took five minutes and looked at results and what's happened and where those dollars have gone, they would be very proud of our community, how we are the model of exactly how we are not doing that. Yep. And like you said, it costs ten times more to address homelessness after it already happens. And most of the time, people are ending up homeless simply because they're in a temporary situation where they can't pay their rent, especially here in Idaho. We don't have a lot of people that are ending up homeless because they're addicted to drugs or anything like that. It's it's that they're working lower wage jobs. Our rent has increased by 40% in recent years. They're paying a majority of their income towards their rent. They're working, they're door dashing, they're you know, uber eating, they're doing all that they can. And then medical emergency is very common. A divorce, you know, a job loss, cut in hours leads them suddenly to a place where they could become homeless. And so, what small investment can we make in those families now that will allow them to avoid homelessness and avoid that 10 times or 20 times investment that we'll have to make if we allow them to become homeless? How also can we make housing more attainable and affordable for those people so we have less people paying a majority of their income towards their rent? And that's I want to shift into that, but before we leave, because I really that's what I really want to talk to you about today, because we've talked about the homelessness stuff before, but I do want to really emphasize I think that Mayor McLean and the city of Boise has done a tremendous job. I mean, I get into debates sometimes with some of my friends and people, and I'm like, study the issue and tell me one legitimate thing that hasn't like been a grand slam out of the park. And and as evidence, I I've been doing a lot of stuff in Reno the last couple of years, and they have a problem. They do, a big problem. And then you come here, walk our streets, look at the safety. And I think how how she and the city have embraced public safety. You have to have safety and ordinances that work, and you have to have investments that are smart investments, and homelessness is a housing problem. So you kind of take care of those people on that very that's that uh like the Alice, like asset limited, income constrained, but employed, like it that's where people fall off the cliff, right? And then there is there is some mental illness, there is some of the those services. And I look at the work that Reverend Bill has done for he's retiring now, but like like look at the work they've done and look at the work of the you know we've got a we've got some generational changes right now. Yeah, think about right now you've got WCA switching over. You got WCA uh I don't know if you count Jesse Tree, but I was there for seven years. You were there so Jesse Tree, yeah. Seven years, B Black at WCA and Reverend Bill, like incredible work. Great leaders stepping up into those orgs and continuing the work. So and they do for anyone listening, if you are looking for a place to volunteer or if you're looking for a place to donate or really learn more about the tremendous work, like literally God's work on earth that happens at these places. Check out Boise Rescue Mission, WCA, Jesse Tree, catch Catch. Those are those are the big ones. So Catch, Jesse Tree, W there's probably more of them, and I don't want to offend anybody, but those are the ones that I know a lot about. Right. They've done great work. They've done great work. And then you look at what efforts um with public-private partnerships have happened with the city. I look at the work Caleb Roop has done. Yep. Thank the Lord that Caleb Roop settled in Eagle, Idaho, and has done all this stuff because it's been it's been tremendous what he's done. Anyway, a lot of great work. Getting people out of homelessness um quickly and efficiently. And yeah, we've done a lot of work to new the new triage system. Yeah. That was incredible a couple years ago of how we triage and get people to the resources that they need. Um anyway. I thought of done a lot of great work. I think it was great having one of the topics for today is just if you're out there and you hear anyone talking about how we're doing the wrong things in Idaho or in Boise, there there's they're misinformed. And walk our streets. Period. They're misinformed. And if you need proof, walk our
Rent Math That Breaks Working Families
streets. Challenge anybody, walk our streets. What I really wanted to get in, because this is what I'm going to learn from you today, is what I really want to talk about is the affordability crisis. Because this is this is there's like debates high and low in and out on this stuff. So are you ready? I'm so ready. Well, yes. Okay, you start. I'll let you well, um, you know, I was excited to take so my new role is at a new organization that launched in December. I think, you know, that's part of why we're here today. Is um it's called Gem State Housing Alliance. But we were talking about at Jesse Tree and with community partners, like, hey, housing is too expensive, you know, at a Jesse Tree. Like, I'm tired of having to raise all this money. So that this is the transition. This is how it plays into the pay all these people. So you had you had X amount of people that were on the line. That Alice population. Hey, I have my car breaks down, um, my kid has an expense, I have a medical expense, and it pushes me from housed to homeless. Yep. When our houses when our housing prices go through the roof like they have, and all the the one, the one I I said this in the intro, but I but I thought this was incredible. That here we go. Uh a full-time worker must earn an hourly wage of $27.83 to afford the fair market rent for a two-bedroom rental. Minimum wage worker, 126 hours per week, or 3.1 full-time jobs just to afford a one-bedroom apartment, or 154 hours a week, or 3.8 full-time jobs to afford a two-bedroom apartment. Think about those statistics. We have now pushed rents and cost of housing to the population that is getting pushed into homelessness now is just bigger, and that's our transition, and your transition and it's costs have increased by 40% just in recent years, and that did it double the demand for our services, Jesse Tree, catch our shelters, just in the last five or six years since our and we will celebrate, which we should celebrate. Yeah. You know, I'm old enough now that 20 years ago you'd be sitting in all these committees and we would talk about wages all the time. How do we keep kids in Idaho? Because what we were doing before then is we just didn't have the industry and jobs, people would go away, or they would just couldn't find a job, or the wages that were paid here were different than other places. We have seen significant wage growth. Right. Go across, you pick the industry, our wage growth has been great. But in comparison to our housing costs, we lag severely behind those wage growths. So even though it's a good thing that our kids are staying here and wanting to come here and the jobs are here, and Micron's doing what they're doing, and everything's booming like crazy, our cost of living because of housing is not kept up with that. We're the second least affordable state in the nation. When you compare wages to housing, and some people do say it's a wage issue, but it's a housing cost issue. Our housing costs have almost doubled in recent years again. And it is just because of our population growth, our supply is not keeping up. And a lot of our cities and now, yeah, our state are trying to do things to build more supply. No, developers are working on so many different projects across the state. We see housing cropping up everywhere, but it's still not enough. And we need to do more. Tell us about your new organization now, because this is the new focus we've got. We are focused
Gem State Housing Alliance And Supply
on supply. And this is a big deal because you're you're not going to run for the legislature. You're in a new role, you're the right person to do this. So let's talk about it. I've established a great board of directors and policy advisor board, including Caleb Roop, who's our board president. So unbelievable. Um, a lot of great people work together to create this organization. And the idea was we were all talking about how housing is too expensive, you know, housing costs have increased, but we don't have an organization taking that conversation to the next step, which is okay, what do we do about it? Um, I don't know about you, but I've been on about 20 calls where everyone's like, housing's too expensive. Yeah. And the call ends, and you're like, well, what am I supposed to do? So our role is to try to give people those answers and what they can do and build a coalition of pro housing advocates, developers, you know, architects, people across the state to get more engaged in policy advocacy, talking to their elected officials at every level of government. And we're also working directly with elected officials at every level of government, helping them understand what they can do, what they should do, what are best practices. Um, so that's what we're working on. Um, a big area of interest for us is um we have a whole policy agenda, but just making it easier to build more homes.
Why Infill Housing Takes So Long
Let's let's talk. You're gonna get me going. I know I you are gonna get me going. I want to hear your complaints as a developer. I'm I'm but it's hard to build housing. I don't want to be that guy, but man, I'm I'm gonna be your guy. So so policy number one, make it easier to do stuff. Let's just start there. That's our mission statement. You had to judge right now how easy it is to do things in the city of Boise. Well, it depends on what type of home you're building, but I would say some homes are definitely harder to build than others, not only in Boise, but a lot of cities, um, especially homes that are smaller, like infill projects are more unique or um development in projects that are not typical, you know, typically allowed in our historical zones. Let me give you let me give you some scenarios because I get really upset about all this. I'll let you talk about No, no, because I I really want to help, I really, I really want to be part of the solution. Yeah. But it but you know how irritating it is for me to sit through, like we'll we'll meet with City of Boise a lot about new stuff and new projects, and you'll have someone very judgmentally look at you and say, Well, what are you going to do about affordability? And what are you going to do about low-income housing? And what are you gonna do about this? And what I want to say, my quiet voice inside my head is saying, Do you freaking know how difficult you guys are to work with on every single issue? So let's say I want to let's talk in, Phil. If I had Steve Martinez on here with me, he would be even more fired up. So, yeah, I I need him here to be the mean one. He would be more fired up. But if you said I want to go put two fourplexes on a lot on coal road, go. What would like how brutal that would be right now? It would be so brutal. It would take you, it would take you a year to probably get that thing approved to where you can go forward. Yep. I hear from small developers every day that say, especially infill developers that deal with those challenges. And I get frustrated. I think we all get frustrated because we drive around, we're like, wow, there's a great piece of land right there on this existing infrastructure. We've got roads nearby, schools, all this stuff. We could build some really cool projects, a cottage court. You said four some four plexes, like you said, um maybe a mid-rise apartment. But those infill projects in particular are very challenging to develop compared to uh what we tend to allow in our codes across cities in Idaho historically, which is large lot, single family developments on an urban fringe. So I do think we just have a long way to go in terms of updating our codes and kind of flipping the script on housing. But they just updated the codes, okay? So Boise. We're still talking about Boise. Boise did modernize itself. Here was the big lie of the Basics. And they did make some changes to do that, but in the process, things definitely got more complicated too. And um I think and and uh that's the case for any city. They're they're really trying. I think it's very challenging because you've got planners at the city level who are very detail-oriented people, and we've got a very long code. Um, and this is you know what I hear from developers across the state and working with planners is um they're more detail-oriented people. Their job is to like follow the code. And so if the code is very detailed, that's gonna cause challenges because there's a lot of details. And then you got developers, big pictures. That's not even the problem. Because you'll go, you'll say, you'll go the staff. Let me be clear like I think Boise City staff has been awesome. But the but the big the big lie was hey, we're gonna work with you early, right? You're gonna check every box on the code, and there's a lot. Right. You're gonna, you're gonna, we're gonna tell you it's six hundred pages. Tell you everything on those 600 pages that you need to do to do a project. Right. And we're going to work with you, and then we're going to tell you, okay, you've met all our chain, you've met all our stuff. Now you're going to go to design review. Right. Okay. Then you go to design review, which is its own experience, the People's Republic of Design Review. I mean, this thing's crazy. And you can't start your design until you get through there because they may change everything. Right. So then you go there, and then they can change everything. They can do whatever they want to do that doesn't tie to code. Right. I don't want to throw a Boise under the bus because, you know, I work a lot with Boys. I don't want to. I'm trying to help them. They're our capital city, right? I think they're motivated to continue to improve the code. And I think that's a good thing. You know, we changed the code to the idea was to modernize it. And 2023, we passed, you know, the modern zoning code unanimously, city council. And the idea was we get more infill, we get more middle housing, small homes across the city and ADUs by right, you know, which did create a lot of ADUs. We have seen more plexus get built. Um, but there's still room for improvement. I think they know that and they're updating the code every year. I'm hopeful, and they've told me that this year they plan to make it continually easier to build more. Just please advocate for us. It's gotta it's gotta be their process. We'll keep at it. Their process is so much worse now than it's ever been. That then, and then you get on the back end, then they approve. So then if you get through design review, then you can finally design your plans, then you submit them for permit. It takes longer than ever for a permit to get through. They scrub it again during permits, then you go out, then you have these inspectors that are I don't know where they've come in from. Right. But right now, if you talk to any project anywhere about the current inspection process, right, it's unbelievable. Yeah the delays and timing on that. And so, so like I've definitely heard about challenges from different developers. So now think about how it sounds. And I know they hear it. When you're telling me our top priority is housing. Yep. Our top priority is taking care of our people and providing options. It is making it easier to build homes. So we've got to address the zoning challenges at every city. I just don't want to, you know, in order to get to advocate, like for me, it's important to work collaboratively with everybody. So I try not to, you know, throw certain cities under the bus or anything like that, um, at least out in on a podcast or whatever. Oh, I get that, I get that, but like working more, I think it's I think I think if I were um if I were in healthcare, yeah, and I were, hey, my most important thing that I wake up and go to bed at night is thinking about trying to bring down healthcare costs. And then you came into me and I charged you 18 times as much this month as I did last month, yeah. Pretty soon, no matter what you told me, I would like shake my head and say, Right, you don't get it. I mean, I think that's where we are. Yeah, that's where we are. Like we're to the point where the rubber needs to meet the road. Either, either you fix it or you don't, but you can't have it both ways. Because they will they will also, I'm finely glad they're talking about like, because if you it it also is really irritating to hear, like, we don't want to sprawl, right? But you can't develop in the city. Right. I know. And but you can't, it's hard to develop in the city. And that's every city where people are talking about we don't want more growth, you know, and it's like, well, how come we're allowing our counties to develop giant homes and but I love this question, right? Yeah. Okay, so you can't do it in the city because it's just too hard. It's too hard, and we haven't updated most of our codes since we're gonna be able to do that. So now we're gonna go to now we're gonna go to a county or we're gonna go to Star. Yeah, Star. The fastest growing city in Idaho right now. And you go to Star and you say, Okay, let's go start building some homes in Star, which then creates the sprawl,
Sprawl, Infrastructure Costs, And Who Pays
right? Yep. Which now you've got a fee thing and you're going, okay, but but but we need it all. We need it all. We need all housing. And so we're not an anti-sprawl organization, but I think when we um talk to cities about things like infrastructure, which right now cities are really struggling with things like you know, paying for basic infrastructure because you know what they did in Utah? I was down with Spencer Cox. He's got a new initiative 50,000 new starter homes. Yeah, they do. And his and and he put together like a multi-million dollar fund to just lend cities the money to keep up with infrastructure just to start get starter homes going. We need that. He's gonna like the the they're just so much more proactive because they realize because what's gonna happen is the second that Mayor Chadwick, who is doing it right now, says, Yep, we can't afford it and girls are gonna pay for girls, so we're gonna start putting a twenty to thirty to forty thousand dollar fee for each new residential home, which he's gonna have to do to kind of cover stuff, right? Yep. What does that do to pricing? Right. It increases prices. All those costs get passed to consumers. The second it's a cost shift. But the city second the city makes it so hard that you can't do anything or so costly or it takes twice as long and it doesn't bill. What happens to pricing? Prices go up. So it I guess I love the fact that you're doing this because it we you can't you can't say it anymore if you don't do the things that make sense. And we need our state to be more active on this issue. They did just pass a lot of housing bills, but I think they need to do more on infrastructure in particular and allowing cities to allow have growth pay for itself. So yes, those costs don't get passed to consumers, and so that development is easier, especially building the types of homes that we need, like we're talking about. Can you ask one more question for me? Because it won't be me, and you'll get an answer. The other thing that I find just like who do I ask this question to? To whoever you want to, because I'm excited. And then you can then you can ask it. Okay. If I'm in one more meeting with someone that actually has the ability to make things easier to let the free market go, like my role in life is front and center with saying I can make it easier for the free market to respond and make things cheaper. And I'm not doing that. Yet I'm telling everyone that the government coming in and subsidizing housing is the answer. Right. Someone needs to explain basic economics to that person who doesn't understand economics. Yeah. That if we don't loosen up this side of it, you could throw government money at this stuff all day long and it won't help the problem. Right. And I don't think they, I don't think it connects. And I and I'm not the right person to ask the question because I lose my I'm irritated when I ask it. But you are so nice. I think we have to do both. You are so nice, you can ask the question in a way where like you can say, can I ask you a question? Like, you how does this work in your mind? Because I really think there are some people who feel like the answer is just more subsidies. More subsidies, which it's part of the solution, it's not the solution. We I mean, I'm when it comes to housing, I'm definitely more of a free market capitalist because we just need to build more housing. I think you need to be clear, I think you need to build. It's a capitalist product. But some, you know, inherently, if we have more supply, cost is gonna go down, especially if we have supply of different types and sizes that meet different people's needs. Um yeah, we allow for more of these missing middle projects like you're talking about. Um, on the other hand, we're not gonna see the market, no matter how much supply we build, we're not gonna see the market provide for people at 50% intermediate income. So we got to build those types of homes too, but we can't tie those um those requirements onto anything that's gonna just you know constrain our supply more generally. If your focus is lean towards that and not that, right, you're just gonna you're you're gonna chase your tell forever because you're gonna create more of that because you haven't done that. Right. And that's my only point that you're gonna do. At least lie to me. Right. Like, please just lie to me and tell me we're gonna be more efficient, we're gonna make it easier, but they're not even lying. Right. Well, it's not even on their radar. How building housing is so expensive, and projects have to pencil. And if we put too many requirements on developers, it's gonna be more challenging for those projects to pencil, or they're just not gonna build get built, like you said, or they're gonna be more expensive. And again, those costs are the choices to rent those are the choices. What are we gonna do? So tell me about how your board's gonna work. So you've got a board. We got a board and a policy advisory board, about 30 people involved, and um, yeah, some founding members. I love this so much. So we're yeah, we're already working with cities on providing them options for um revising their code and we're building a legislative agenda for 2027 to see what we can do. Um, we're providing technical assistance to a lot of cities and elected officials. We have a lot of new elected officials across the state. I think we have 39 new mayors in Idaho, and a lot of them haven't worked in housing. You know, they're new to the topic and are you looking at what's been successful in other states that you're modeling some of that policy after? Yeah, so um, and other states and cities were part of this national network. So, yeah, looking at um what other cities have done, some cities in Texas have done really great things. Um even Portland did something unique with their Plexes. Well, they did allow for more um Plexes to get built. Everything else, not so much. Sorry, I shouldn't say Portland anywhere in Idaho on a public platform, but they did something good to incentivize smaller homes to get built. Um, but we talk more about generally best practices that we know work across the country. Um, I always like to platform Post Falls Idaho because they've actually done a really, a lot of really great updates to their code and studies. Um, and they're doing um, they have a great new pro housing mayor and um planning director who's involved with our organization, and they've done a lot, a lot of great updates. Um, so yeah, we've got a lot of examples of what works. We know it works to create more housing. And I think ultimately in looking at the code, it's looking with um with the staff and with electeds collaboratively to see, okay, where are these different types of homes being discriminated against, essentially? Where are we favoring large lot single family development versus these other home types that we're not allowing the market to creatively fill the need for? Um, and so that's been really great. I think people are really receptive to the idea and um excited about
NIMBY Politics And The Anti Growth Trap
it. So we'll see if we can get some code changes through at the local levels to streamline development, make it easier to build more homes. We're a big proponent of building more homes near jobs, more mixed use, commercial. We have a lot of underutilized commercial land in Idaho, and we think that's prime real estate for mixed use and housing. Um, just also um the big other challenge is anti-growth mindsets in Idaho. I was just I was just gonna go there. So even though we are, you know, educating elected officials, what they tell me is that they don't hear from people that are pro-housing in Idaho. Um they have their hearing at 6 p.m. on a Tuesday, and everybody who shows up is against housing, right? Inherently, that's who's gonna show up at 6 p.m. on a Tuesday anyway. Um, so it's been a big issue in elections, too. A lot of people got elected on anti-growth platforms or were pressured in that direction during the election because it was a big challenge for them, big issue. So that's another thing that we're working on. It's an interesting question, right? Because what we find, because we're in those hearings, right? So we we hear the testimonies that a lot of these are outsiders. Yes. The pe they're people that sold their house for a couple million bucks in another location. Everyone picks on California, but that's where a lot of them are coming from. They've moved up here most of the time with a pension, and they've said no more, we don't want to become what we want. And then you hear some from local people. There there is like you, you know, I've I there's a couple of anti-growth council people that we know of that have been elected on that platform. My question to them is if you're waiting for housing prices to stop growth, which it it will at some point, who are you really affecting? Right. And I and I would love to just hear that dialogue. Okay. Because if I'm an Idahoan that lives in Canyon County and I've been elected to the Nampa City Council as an anti-growth candidate, and that's my omission, I'm not going to approve anything that comes through. I'd love to hear the rationale. What is the natural history of that? Like with a disease in medicine, it's like, okay, if I don't treat the disease, that's I I always try to like this a medical term. What's the natural history of cancer? Well, if you don't treat it, it's this, and if you treat it, it's this. So what's the natural history? What's the progression in Canyon County of no more growth? Go and I listen to them. I they can't understand what is going on here. And I'm very fundamentally. I mean, those of us who've grown up here who from here, we're very sensitive to this topic, right? Because I grew up in Middleton surrounded by a farm field. Sure. Those farm fields are now giant suburban neighborhoods, one acre lots. Um, yeah, so farmland's gone from where a lot of us grew up. Um, and so we're all sensitive to it. And I think, but those of us who have been here for a long time know that growth is gonna happen. And so the question has to be framed more as how do we grow? And who are we growing for, like you're saying. So keep going down this because this is this is where I think when you have an intelligent conversation with someone, you will realize that the only answer is the free market. And if government tries to control this, it will be disastrous for families in Idaho. Because if the city council of Nampa tries to restrict and control what happens in Nampa by just saying no growth, it guess what's gonna happen to the cost of housing in NAMPA? It's going to skyrocket. And they're gonna have nobody local who can live or work there, afford to buy a home. Our young people are gonna leave Idaho. Our young people leave Idaho, and that's literally the only answer. That's it. And and and and you can point to any community in the country that has tried to regulate housing or say, no, we we we don't want single family large lot, we don't want single family small lot, we don't want single family, we don't want apartments, we don't want condos, we don't want townhomes. Pick whichever category you're gonna kick out, um, you will hamper what happens across the thing. And I think this is why I love talking to Governor Cox because when you talk to him about he's really good on housing, he's really good on, but but he also like he is a free market guy. So he understands that if I am prescriptive in how this works, it won't work. And and I think if they just I think if we can just let what happens happens, and you can have duplexes and forplexes and town homes and starter homes and multifamily and infill, this will take care of itself. Right. But to force down someone's throat, no, you can only do infill. Right. And you can only do things that fit, and you have these prescriptive codes that the city of Boise just did, and a process that is mind-numbing and expensive and costly, it will never happen. It'll never happen. I mean, Steve Martinez will get in here and tell you he will never do it. He will never, ever, ever, him and his friends, do a uh an infill project because it doesn't pay. It's hard. You can't do it. Any infill developer I talked to who works in any city across Idaho has had big challenges with infill projects. And yeah, I agree with you. Um we need to make it easier to build all types of homes at every price point across Idaho. I do think that, and I know that because of how our codes were written in the 1970s, it is easier to build larger lot developments, you know, single family homes. Why do you why do you think that's code related? I'm I I Well, because they're buy right. So they're kind of administer more administratively approved, whereas duplexes or plexes usually have to go through PUD um, you know, extra processes and approvals in a lot of cities, not in Boise because they have I'm trying to think of I'm trying to think of um I don't know that's true. Okay. Well, I'm I'm just thinking of like in in all our jurisdictions here, if you go from Boise to Caldwell, yeah, I don't think it requires a PUD for for those infill things. For Plexus. Um in a lot of cities they require more special approvals, or they're simply um harder to build because of the dimensional standards. And so if you want to build um a Plex on any lot, um, especially if it's an infill. Let's say, especially if it's infill, um, it's gonna be challenging just because of all the different setback standards, common drive, and other dimensional standards, additional approvals that you have to go through. There's also a lot of unanticipated fines and fees compared to um, I think they're just treated differently. So one thing we advocate for in looking at our code is more parity amongst the different housing types. So we we advocate for let's treat other types of homes just like single family homes. And um, I will say when you compare the real details and itty gritty on how single family homes are treated on large lots, you know, typical suburban, just suburban neighborhoods that are, you know, you typically on our urban fringe, how those are treated in code versus like these smaller home types, um, they are definitely I would say discriminated against. Tell me what that means. Um they're just you know, the standards are such that I mean the devil's in the details, depending on the city. But let's just say let's say City of Boise or Meridian, two of the biggest cities. I'm trying to understand how that because I I I do I've got friends of mine that are that this is the world they live in, and they believe that the next boom, if if if we can make it happen, is kind of the townhome. Town home developments. Town home developments, right? It gives you that you you talk about the missing middle all the time, tell people are nauseous about it, but yeah, it kind of does give you that chance of getting into something that you might be able to afford. That stair step system. We need a $200,000, $300,000 product. But if it was discriminated, I'm trying to understand how, because I do this for a living, yeah. Why I would be deterred from code in Meridian. I think I would be deterred in Boise by their own freaking processes. Right. And not not by like by more process than dimensional standards. Yeah, it's not gonna be a setback. Yeah, it's not gonna be a parking issue, it's going to be mind-numbing process there. And yet they're the ones telling me that they're the most worried about housing. Yeah. Well, I can tell you, I can give you a couple examples. So I just actually met with a developer who does inflow earlier this week, and he was telling me how he was trying to build, he had this kind of uniquely sized infill lot, and he was trying to build three duplexes on it. But because of the setback standards and then some additional standards on common drive and sidewalks and all these other things, he couldn't piece it out to um basically build three, or um, he was even considering doing like a garage with an ADU on top. Um, that didn't work out. So now he's just building two. Um, and there were some additional um processes and fees um that he was not expecting to that he had to deal with. Um another challenge is the minor land division process. Yes, that yeah.
Code Barriers Like Minor Land Divisions
So if we talk about that, that's that's probably I'm sure I'm I'm literally trying to learn how to do that. That's where a lot of things get well, and I'm not a developer. So I've learned this from my members since I started this job, but you know, but so what this would be is like if let's say you have a two-acre lot and you wanted to do something that is needs to have its own parcel number in order to for financing. There's a lot of reasons for that buyer to come in and be able to have their own parcel. Even if it's got a common wall, you can have a defined parcel with a unit above it. So then you would need to go divide that land. Well, now you're talking about platting. Yep. And if you want to like, okay, you went from brain damage to ultra brain damage, now you just added a whole nother so the so it's a big problem. It's probably worth for people listening. So the first, there's an underlying comprehensive plan. So any city you go to, every land use you go to, we'll walk into the city and say, What's the comp plan show here? So if the comp plan from 20 years ago said industrial and you want to do a living unit, you have to go through a comprehensive plan change to be able to build a house on something that said industrial, even though 20 years ago, when they put this through, they didn't know what was gonna happen 20 years from now. So the first thing is you've got a comp plan problem. Most people will say that is such brain damage, we will we don't ever want to go change a comprehensive plan. Developers want predictability, they're gonna develop what's legal. Yeah, and so so it's it's not even worth it. So now you go to go, okay, in the comprehensive plan, does it say residential? Then if it says residential, it will say R1, R2, R3, R4, or whatever. So let's say you've got two acres that was put into a place that was R1, meaning one unit per acre or whatever. We can pick whichever one, and you say, okay, I want to go change the use. That's gonna require an entire process through the city where you're going to be scrutinized 10 ways to Tuesday to try to meet the needs of changing it to R whatever you want to do to be able to do two units on this thing. And the point is that acreage of property as infill is going to be worth more and be more expensive than a something that's out in the middle of nowhere. So the first thing is if the city really wanted you to build two units on there, they would try to make it easier to go from R1 to R2. Now the next thing is you're gonna have neighbors. So now you've got someone that's been there forever, and they've said, okay, I moved here in 1972. And when I moved here, I thought that I was gonna have one acre lots next to me. And now Joe Blow wants to come put two duplexes here, and it's gonna be poor people. They're gonna come live here and they're gonna be horrible. They're gonna come steal my stuff, and it's gonna be horrible. And this is just horrible. The worst thing that's ever happened to me. And if I I would have never moved. Here in 1972, if I would have known you were going to put a duplex here. So that's what then you have that. But then you go through, you have to go get it rezoned to allow for two, okay, which is a giant process. Neighborhood meetings, um, planning and zoning, city council, probably uh eight, then you gotta get it platted. So that whole process is a good thing. Then you gotta get it platted. And plating in the county with the city. The minor land division process I've heard is a lot more challenging than the regular subdivision process. So that's gonna take you a year. Yep. A best case scenario year. Now you've got to go design it, deal with the setbacks, go through all the setbacks, go submit the permits to the city, because now you can submit a permit, and now you've got to deal with ACHD because they're gonna they're gonna comment and say, well, how does this affect how you're approaching the road? And we don't like that. And oftentimes the city's at odds with ACHD. And all the other districts, and all the other so all of a sudden the irrigation district says you gotta refix this whole irrigation system from that's a fifty thousand dollar cost. So they're all fighting amongst themselves and oftentimes telling you uh conflicting things. So let me give you a real-time example. We're doing the CWI project in Boise, ACHD wants a crosswalk, uh, the city of Boise doesn't. We get stuck for six months between the two of them trying to decide whether we put a crosswalk in. Right. It has nothing to do with us, but it just added six more months to the thing because they can't decide what what they want. And we're like, we don't care, we just want a project. So that's that process. Then you're gonna go submit. Now, if you can get all that figured out, you can submit a building permit, and now you're gonna go meet with the staff under the new code, they're gonna meet with you 15 times and say, hey, everything's great. Then you're gonna go to design review. You're gonna go to design review, you're gonna get up there in the councils, you're gonna have someone that say, you know what? I think that the way you did that roof line is not what I like. Um, it's in it's on the bench. And on the bench, I like roof lines that are flat, and I don't like colors beige. I like the color light beige. Go back, and then they come back a few times, and then you're through that. And well, now you can finally go to to your construction drawings, then you can submit it to the city, then you can wait a couple months, and then you can go. Then you gotta go P and Z, hopefully. Check that out. That is that is to do that is to do a long process development. Yep. So that's what I mean. It was the harder. It's harder. But you can't and you did a that was a great summary. I'm gonna I'm gonna write that down and but but like in the that's why when you're sitting there talking to someone that works for the city, the same organization that is flogging you and causing the pain is telling you this is the solution versus doing duplexes on the fringe of the city or uh unleashing South Boise where you could do new development. Right. We got to make it easier to build homes on Intel. And this isn't just Boise. You didn't know what you were in for today, did you? I talked to well, I hope I don't get in trouble. But uh maybe you will, but I'm not gonna get in trouble. I mean, I see this happen at city councils across the state every week. And yeah, design review is a challenge in a lot of I mean, I even see city council members shutting down projects because of design issues, um, which they're not really supposed to do. But my take on that, even if it's if it's a city council member who says, I absolutely hate the way you did that roof. I hate the color of the building, I wish it would have been brick. At least they were elected. Right. If I'm an appointed design review person who just woke up that day and beat their dog and hates their life and comes in and says, they have no accountability. They have no they they they they don't answer to anybody. Yeah, I can't get them unseated. They they get appointed for three years and they can be a pain in the ass till the cows come home. Right. Well, I think I mean you're absolutely right. The big picture is housing is very hard to build. Your job is really hard. I don't know why you would go from being an ER doctor to a developer. Now we're gonna get into the psyche of why you do this. You're just you like the challenge. I do think, listen, I think these are big topics because I love the fact that we're talking about it because you hear people, you'll hear people that don't get it. Yeah. And and they're uneducated. I get I get more pissed at the people who are in the know, who live in the in a city and and think that they're like the more I'm gonna get in trouble. Well, in the positive view, I think everybody wants to do the right thing. Like, I know our planners across the state really want more housing, you know, ultimately, big picture. Um, a lot of our elected officials want more affordable housing. I don't think that everybody has the same idea of how we can get there. Um, one of the purposes of our group is to kind of educate about like, here's actually how we get there. You know, here are the best practices. Let's get everybody saying the same thing and the same understanding and kind of moving in the same direction because I think just in the past in recent years, especially recently with our population growth, um, you do get a lot of pushback on housing supply. And I don't think people really understand like what the impacts of that are and where that's gonna take us, which is gonna take us to a place where we have more homelessness ultimately. So bringing it back to the beginning. And the crazy thing is like they're the ones that are like it is the the guys preaching, right, to the choir are the ones that they ought to be required. I I've always said, like you, I'll never forget. It was really, really funny because in in our church we have like lay ministry, like so people just serve in different callings that are yeah, yeah. I know I grew up in Middleton. I know how it all works, the callings. You get all that calling stuff. And I remember one time I was serving in a calling and I had and it was before I had teenagers, and and one of my good friends, Mark Peterson, said to me, He said, You should never be allowed to do this until you've had your own teenagers. And I said, Why is that because you you don't have the right to talk to other parents and counsel them before you've had your own teenagers? And then I had my own teenagers, and I'm like, you were so right. You shouldn't be able to be a planner unless you have taken your own dollars out of your wallet and gone and tried to do it, do a duplex. That ought to be like the job number one is go take your own treasure, go get on a loan, go go go hire an architect. Right. I think go put a duplex through and then come back and tell us how we should do this. I'm gonna shout out Urban Land Institute because they do that exercise with different groups where planners have to be developers and developers have to be planners, and everybody's mind just gets blown. And the architects like look at the pro forma and they're like, oh wow, that roof I design costs like way too much. Well, well, well, heaven bless you for doing this. So you're kicked off.
How To Join The Pro Housing Coalition
We're kicked off. Now we're just working with cities. So any cities that are listening, we're here as a resource for you. We're trying to find willing pro housing elected officials across the state who are willing to work with us on zoning reviews. We're also just building our coalition again, trying to organize pro-housing Idahoans into political action, getting them to talk to elected officials and tell them what they want to see. Because one thing we hear from elected officials as a challenge again is that they only hear from the NIMBY's. They only hear from people that don't want housing. And I think part of that is because we haven't had a group like this that's kind of organizing conversations and again, getting everybody to say the same thing. Does it need like even almost a bigger campaign? Like because here's the deal like I'm I'm working on a trap, uh like uh traffic thing right now. I know, that's cool. I love that. So it's awesome, but but one of the things we have, it's very in fact, I'm just thinking this out. One of the things I tell Garrett Loft all the time, like, because we get frustrated, like, man, people don't want to be proactive, and sometimes you may have to pay a little more to make sure we don't get stuck and have to pay even more. But one of the things that are in our our advantage on the keep Idle Moving is just go get out on the freeway. Right. At some point, there will be an absolute revolt where people are gonna go, Are you kidding me? Yeah, figure it out. Right. With housing, with housing, it's already there. You can have all these Californians come here and you can have them get up and you can have them bitch and moan about everything that comes through. And you can have Yeah, you said it, not me. You could have you could have planners that are clueless about free market economic economics, are mayors elected or city council people elected on an anti-growth thing. At some point, there there will be a revolt in this valley. I just hope they there already is. I just hope they understand the causal side of it, right? I mean, people are people are worried. Young people, I would say, are at revolt levels. You hear from young people all the time that are like, I was told that I could get my degree, get a good job working at Micron or the hospital. But what are their solutions? Is it universal income? Is it the government paying for me? Right. What's the other solution? Well, but because I I honestly wonder, like I look at that generation, I would be pissed too if I were them. Yeah. But do they understand that it's regulation and they process? We are trying to teach them and show them that and get them more politically engaged on the topic because I think at this point they're throwing their hands up and they don't know. They don't people, I would say no, housing is so expensive, but again, general population, I would say we don't know how to get there and what we need to do to fix it. Do you know we're at a four-year low on costs? For cost of living, costs of materials, materials, and housing still. Four year low more than half a million dollars. I've got a good friend who tracks like literally it's a craziest spreadsheet, uh, tracks um the cost of every item you can imagine. And what he does is he tracks it at Home Depot so that there's no issues of what it is, but just what what's the cost of a four by four? What's the cost of a nail? What's the cost of sheathing? What what's all the cost right now? And when I hear that, I'm like, oh my goodness. So that's not the problem. Yeah, but labor, if you actually hear, like, if you hear so this is this is this is a little data point for you. Labor's a cost. But right now, if you talk to framers and sheetrockers in this valley right now, they're they're looking for work, even with micron going on. Now that may change because if you look at if you look at the micron workflow, um plumbers, electricians, welders, sheetrockers, everything, i it's got an ebb and flow to it. So it may be where we're in that ebb and flow. But that's not the problem. No. So what's the problem? Um regulation red tape. It is. It's a large part of your costs as a developer. And I would say regulation red tape process and anti-growth mindsets that cause less housing of different types and sizes to get built because our free market capitalists can't just build what they want to. They've got to build what is required in code, and that prevents a lot of different types of housing that we need from getting built. This has been like the coolest thing. I know you've had I know you've had we I don't think we got in trouble, do you? No, I hope not. We'll see if I get a call. Well, again, like my approach is to work like I don't want to throw anybody under the table. You have stopped me multiple times and said that you're here to just help. I get it. Hey, we gotta focus on the solutions. Hey, we are we are too. I mean, I think uh I guess um I guess they just need to if they just Hey, you gotta use your developer voice to talk about your challenges. They just need to pretend. I like like I I walk out of these meetings and I'll look at Ryan Cutler, who works with me, he's my development guy, and I'm like, you know what would make me feel good? At least look me in the eye and pretend that you understand the issues. Just take it because I'll go home and feel better about it. But when you've been in the legislature for a long time, I know how that feels. But so Allie, thank you for having me. Tommy, thanks for having me. And yeah, well, let's do this. I'm excited. I would love to. Yeah. Like like once you get rolling. Yeah, hey, we're rolling. I think this would be awesome to periodically. How can we help? How can the public help? Um, so they can become a member of our organization. Um What's your URL? It's gemstatehousing.org. Gemstatehousing.org. We have a membership program, people can donate, and that essentially goes to our housing action fund through which we work with the cities and support the cities. Um, so people can donate. I think the big thing is signing up for our newsletter because we do want to just grow our coalition of pro housing out of homes at this time. So you've got you've got gemstatehousing.org. There is learn more. There's a newsletter to sign up for. There's a way to donate, probably volunteer to help you guys and what you do. You are the executive director. I'm the executive director. Executive director. Yeah. Tremendous experience. Tremendous experience. Legislature and longtime advocate for lots of things that that help families and people. This is native Idaho and from Middleton. Hey, and I want I want my kids to stay here. That's what it's all about, right? We all want our kids to be able to thrive here in Idaho and I'm motivated in that way. This isn't a problem that many communities are dealing with, right? It's just how what what do we learn from the other ones? How do we do it better? Yeah. We know it works to create more housing, so let's do it. Let's do it. You're the best. Thank you so much. Thanks, Tommy. Thanks, everybody.