⚖ TBC Intelligence

This accountability brief is available to TBC Intelligence members.

What HDC Is

The Housing Development Consortium of Seattle-King County is the trade association for the affordable housing industry in the Puget Sound region. It has over 215 member organizations: nonprofit housing developers, service providers, housing authorities, banks, architects, contractors, law firms, and consultants. If your organization builds, finances, designs, or operates affordable housing in King County, you are probably an HDC member.

HDC does not build housing. It does not operate shelters. It does not provide services. What it does is lobby. It lobbies the Seattle City Council, King County Council, and the Washington State Legislature on behalf of its members. And it is very good at it.

The Numbers

The budget is small. The influence is not. HDC claimed credit for securing $350 million in the adopted Seattle city budget, including $170 million in NOFA (Notice of Funding Availability) and $28 million in "operations stabilization" for its member organizations. That is a 219-to-1 return on a $1.6 million lobbying operation.

How It Works

HDC's members include the organizations that receive public housing funds: Plymouth Housing, DESC, LIHI, Catholic Community Services, Compass Housing Alliance, Chief Seattle Club, and dozens more. HDC lobbies the city and county to increase those funds. The funds flow to HDC's members. HDC's members pay dues to HDC. HDC uses the dues to lobby for more funds.

This is not illegal. It is how trade associations work. But it creates a closed loop where the organizations that receive public money fund the lobbying that secures more public money, and at no point in the cycle does anyone ask whether the money is producing results.

The $350 Million Question

HDC's 2022-2025 strategic plan focuses on policy advocacy and systems change. The wins they claim are measured in dollars secured: $170M in NOFA funding, $28M in operations stabilization, $350M total in the adopted budget. These are input metrics. They measure how much money went in, not what came out.

Here is what HDC does not publish:

How many people moved from homelessness to stable independent housing as a result of the $350 million? What is the cost per successful outcome? How do Seattle's outcomes compare to peer cities spending similar amounts? Which member organizations are producing results and which are not?

The answer to all of these questions is: nobody knows, because nobody is tracking it, and the organization whose job it is to advocate for the housing system has no incentive to ask.

The Member Network

HDC's 215 members include the biggest recipients of public homelessness and housing funds in King County:

HDC also includes the banks that finance affordable housing projects (Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase), the law firms that structure the deals (Perkins Coie, Davis Wright Tremaine), the architects who design them, and the contractors who build them. Every part of the affordable housing supply chain is represented, and every part benefits from increased public spending.

The Policy Positions

HDC advocates for Housing First as the primary model for addressing homelessness. Housing First means providing housing without requiring sobriety, employment, or treatment compliance. The model is supported by some research (the DESC 1811 Eastlake JAMA study) but has come under increasing criticism from communities where Housing First facilities have generated significant police responses, overdose incidents, and neighborhood impacts.

HDC has not publicly advocated for outcomes-based funding, performance audits of member organizations, or alternative models to Housing First. Its advocacy is focused on increasing the total dollars available to its members, not on ensuring those dollars produce measurable results.

Leadership

Patience Malaba, Executive Director ($174,645). Holds an MPA from Seattle University and previously worked in organizational leadership. Recognized for work at the intersection of affordable housing, racial equity, and climate change.

Previous ED was Martin Kooistra ($165,649 in 2021), who led the organization through a period of significant budget growth.

Key Questions

1. Of the $350 million HDC claims to have secured in the city budget, what percentage went to organizations that can demonstrate measurable outcomes beyond housing retention?

2. Does HDC track or publish comparative performance data across its member organizations?

3. Has HDC ever advocated for outcomes-based funding models that would tie public dollars to measurable results?

4. How much of HDC's revenue comes from member dues paid by organizations that receive the public funding HDC lobbies for?

5. What is HDC's position on the increasing community opposition to Housing First facilities in Burien, Bellevue, Kenmore, and Redmond?

Related Briefs

Plymouth Housing: $69.5M revenue, $22.4M deficit, 148 police calls at Bellevue facility.

DESC: $103.4M revenue. Deputy Director on state Appropriations Committee. 600 police calls at Burien shelter.