OLYMPIA, WA – Microsoft President Brad Smith leads some of the tech giant’s work in areas ranging from artificial intelligence to cybersecurity to environmental sustainability.
Right now, housing issues before the Washington state Legislature are getting his attention.
The company is out with a 10-page report with housing priorities it wants to see lawmakers in Olympia tackle this year. Higher taxes to pay for housing programs are not part of that platform. And Smith rejects the notion that raising taxes on large corporations is a viable pathway to close the state’s affordable housing gap.
Instead, the company’s strategy relies on opening more land for residential development, speeding permitting, driving down material and construction costs, and looking for innovative ways the public and private sectors can work together to get more housing built.
Some of that aligns neatly with legislation lawmakers have floated this year. For instance, Senate Bill 6026 would ban counties and cities from blocking residential construction in commercial or mixed-use zones. Gov. Bob Ferguson requested that bill. Sens. Emily Alvarado, D-West Seattle, and Jessica Bateman, D-Olympia, are lead sponsors.
Smith voiced support for this and other housing measures focused on reducing obstacles to permitting and financing. And he endorsed Ferguson’s proposal to pump $225 million more into the state’s primary account for affordable housing construction.
“You can’t have a healthy company unless you’re in a healthy community. And right now, I think that the affordable housing issue has possibly become one of the most important affordability issues in the state of Washington,” he told the Standard in an interview on Thursday.
There’s another reason that he says he’s taking an interest: “We’ve spent a lot of money.”
Since 2019, the company says it has dished out $750 million in the Puget Sound region, mostly in loans, but also some grants, for low- and middle-income housing and to curb homelessness. Microsoft says the money has helped add or preserve 16,000 homes over the six years.
“I feel that the money was very well spent, but it did not go as far as I would have hoped,” Smith said. “We need to be building 55,000 new units every year in this state,” he added. “Last year, the number of units permitted was only 33,600.”
In the Democratic Party’s progressive camp, there are state lawmakers and activists who argue that companies like Microsoft are not paying enough in taxes. They have ideas about how to overhaul the tax code to change this and generate more dollars for state programs and services.
Take, for example, the payroll tax on large companies that Rep. Shaun Scott, D-Seattle, has proposed. He wants to see the potential revenue flow to areas like education, health care, human services and housing.
Asked about the contention that Microsoft should pay more in taxes to help cover affordable housing, Smith replied, “Higher taxes cannot put even a small dent in this huge problem.”
“We need the kinds of measures that will really energize the private sector, and that means bringing costs down. It means helping permitting go faster,” he said. “I think it’s very clear that that’s where the solution lies, not frankly, a huge amount of more spending by the government.”
This story first appeared on Washington State Standard.
