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SALT LAKE CITY — Lou Anne Stevenson knows what it's like not to have a home.
She also knows what it's like to be priced out of Salt Lake City's rental market.
Stevenson lives on about $1,000 a month disability income.
"If it wasn't for Cowboy Partners, I'd be homeless," Stevenson said of the development company behind Liberty CityWalk Apartments, where she has lived for the past four years in an affordable housing unit.
Although Utah's capital city is experiencing a housing construction boom, advocates for the poor say the shortage of affordable rental units has reached a crisis point.
The Low Income Housing Action Coalition's review of affordable housing built since 2009 — or those in the pipeline — indicates that less than 100 units of new low-income, affordable housing have been made available each year.
"At that rate, it will take something like 80 years to meet the 8,240 units needed in the city," the coalition of advocates and clergy wrote in a letter to Charlie Luke, chairman of the Salt Lake City Council.
Tim Funk, housing advocate for Crossroads Urban Center, said Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker's administration has "failed the low-income people in the city."
Just 13 percent of the rentals are in their affordability range.
–2013 Salt Lake City housing market study
Salt Lake City, which conducted its own market study in 2013, found that more than one-third of the city's renter households earn less than $20,000 a year.
"Just 13 percent of the rentals are in their affordability range," the report said.
Yet, Funk said, "they have no solution, none whatsoever at this point."
Art Raymond, spokesman for Becker, said it was "flatly inaccurate to describe our current and ongoing efforts to address affordable housing issues as a failure."
Like other major cities nationwide, Salt Lake City's efforts have been hampered by reductions in federal funding over the past decade, Raymond said.
The city is working on its master plans for downtown and the west side, he said.
"(Affordable housing) is one of the things that largely figures into groundwork we're trying to lay in the master planning process," Raymond said.
The coalition, during a news conference Thursday, called on the city's legislative body, the City Council, to adopt "a bold new strategy to provide housing opportunity for everyone in the city."
The coalition proposes that the city's transit station overlay zone ordinance require 20 percent rent-assisted/subsidized low-income, affordable housing.
Moreover, the city should "prioritize inclusionary zoning options such as density bonuses that encourage and enhance mixed-use and mixed-income development," the letter states.
Glenn Bailey, executive director of Crossroads Urban Center, said about 180 units of new housing are on the block where the nonprofit organization runs a food pantry at 347 S. 400 East.
"None of it's affordable. It's all upper-end housing," Bailey said.
While the new construction is replacing aging structures that needed to be replaced, it has displaced three units of affordable housing.
"Those apartments are gone, and they're not being replaced. They're not going to be part of the 180 units. They're not going to be part of the housing development across the street from the 180 new units," he said.
The letter to Luke calls for a "no net loss" policy when replacing or demolishing existing units of affordable housing for new development.
The Rev. David Nichols, pastor of Mount Tabor Lutheran Church, said the housing boom along the 400 South transit corridor is tantamount to "naked discrimination against the working poor as affluent apartment construction is exploding and low-income housing is shrinking."
The average monthly rent for new two-bedroom apartments is $1,400, Nichols said. It would take more than 30 hours a week for someone working at the minimum wage to earn $900 per month, he said.
"We call on our City Council to help us. Help us make room for the working poor, the carpenter's family, to share the beauty, the diversity and the blessings of our transit corridor. Help us build a diverse community of welcome for all of us to prosper in," Nichols said.
