Kirkland planning commission votes 5-1 to defer citywide inclusionary requirement as it updates middle-housing code

The Kirkland Planning Commission voted 5-1 to recommend that the City Council defer adopting a citywide inclusionary housing requirement tied to the city's middle-housing code updates, after a lengthy staff briefing and public comment.

Planning commissioners and staff said the deferral will allow more time to analyze economic impacts and gather input from builders and other stakeholders before imposing new affordability rules that could alter the cost of constructing small-scale housing.

City staff, led by Scott Guter, described a set of options the commission could send to council. The options addressed three central issues: whether accessory dwelling units (ADUs) should count toward a property's allowed unit density; which of the state-required housing typologies to allow in which zones; and whether to adopt an inclusionary zoning requirement in this first phase of code updates.

Guter told the commission that council had reviewed staff's work and offered specific feedback. He said council favored continuing to exempt ADUs from density calculations but keeping a limit of two ADUs per property. "City council was very,…