A proposed Jefferson County home opportunity fund levy is set to be discussed July 24 at a hearing before the Jefferson County commissioners. There is a reason the hearing is set for 6 p.m. in the Jefferson County Superior Court hearing room.

There’s an expectation that the room will be full of people wanting to weigh in on the subject of whether to put the levy on the Nov. 7 ballot.

Go to the Homes Now! website (homesnowjefferson.org) and you’ll see that a lot of people have been working on this idea. It didn’t just surface.

The Peninsula Housing Authority, Olympic Community Action Programs (OlyCAP), Bayside Housing & Services and EDC Team Jefferson also are supporting the effort, according to that website, which is dedicated to moving the proposal forward and onto the ballot.

In an interview with The Leader last year, Port Townsend City Manager David Timmons acknowledged that a lack of affordable housing has been an issue since he came to Jefferson County 18 years ago.

So the emergency, as the lack of affordable housing is being called now, is something city officials and county officials, and for that matter, the community, have known about for almost two decades.

It’s become a more desperate issue because of the number of homes that have been gobbled up as second residences, the lack of new construction for first-time buyers, and by housing prices that soar beyond the financial capacity of the average wage earner.

Timmons was given the task last year of taking action before he leaves his city manager post, and he’s done that this past year, moving a project with Olympic Housing Trust forward, with the blessing of the City Council.

Timmons also said last year that the only way to accomplish lasting, sustainable affordable housing was through the trust model of ensuring that the underlying land is preserved – and not subject to the ups and downs of real estate.

So now comes Jefferson County’s proposal for a levy to create a local fund that would provide as much as $14 million over seven years to create and preserve affordable housing.

There are a lot of nuances to this proposal. The community needs to discuss it thoroughly – getting beyond the tempting knee-jerk reaction from one side (no new taxes) and the also tempting bleeding-heart reaction to just say yes.

While we’re discussing housing, let’s also not forget about the Tri-Area sewer project, which has also gone unfunded for more than 20 years. If built, the sewer project could help pave the way for not only housing but employment, as well as a third benefit: It could help the environment.

Affordable housing has been a crisis for a long time in Jefferson County.

Let’s take care to discuss the issue thoughtfully and not reactively.

– Allison Arthur