Elections 2021: Renton Must Support our Housing Authority

Revised Code of Washington 35.22.280

First Class City Specific powers enumerated.

Summarized (archaic wording is quoted from the RCW)- Click RCW link above for full text

Any city of the first class shall have power:

(1) To provide for elections

(2) To provide for levying and collecting taxes and to provide for the payment of the debts

(3) To control the finances and property of the city

(4) To borrow money for corporate purposes on the credit of the city

(5) To issue bonds

(6) To purchase or appropriate private property within or without its corporate limits, for city uses

(7) To lay out and regulate use of streets, alleys, avenues, sidewalks, wharves, parks, and other public grounds

(8) To change the grade of any street, highway, or alley within city limits

(9) To authorize or prohibit the locating and constructing of any railroad or street railroad in any street, alley, or public place in the city

(10) To provide for making local improvements, and to levy and collect special assessments on property

(11) To acquire lands for public parks within or without the limits of such city, and to improve the same.

(12) To construct and keep in repair bridges, viaducts, and tunnels, and to regulate the use thereof;

(13) To determine what local improvements are necessary and bill affected property owners

(14) To provide waterworks  within the city

(15) To provide for lighting the streets and all public places, and for furnishing the inhabitants thereof with gas and electric service

(16) To establish and regulate markets, and to provide for the weighing, measuring, and inspection of all articles of food and drink offered for sale thereat and to enforce the keeping of proper legal weights and measures by all vendors in such city.

(17) To erect and establish hospitals and pesthouses, and to control and regulate the same;

(18) To provide for establishing and maintaining reform schools for juvenile offenders;

(19) To provide for the establishment and maintenance of public libraries

(20) To regulate the burial of the dead

(21) To direct the location and construction of all buildings in which any trade or occupation offensive to the senses or deleterious to public health or safety shall be carried on

(22) To provide for the prevention and extinguishment of fires

(23) To establish fire limits and to make regulations for the erection and maintenance of buildings within its corporate limits as the safety of persons or property may require, and to cause dangerous buildings to be made safe;

(24) To regulate the manner in which stone, brick, and other buildings, party walls, and partition fences shall be constructed and maintained;

(25) To deepen, widen,  alter, or change the channels of waterways and courses, and to provide for the canals, slips, public landing places, wharves, docks, and levees

(26) To control, regulate, or prohibit the anchorage, moorage, and landing of all watercrafts and their cargoes within the jurisdiction of the city;

(27) To fix the rates of wharfage and dockage, and to provide for the collection thereof

(28) To license, regulate, control, or restrain wharf boats, tugs, and other boats used about the harbor or within such jurisdiction;

(29) To require the owners of public halls or other buildings to provide suitable means of exit; to abate nuisances; to prevent water pollution;  to quarantine or  make other regulations as may be necessary for the preservation of the public health

(30) To declare what shall be a nuisance, and to abate the same

(31) To regulate the selling or giving away of intoxicating liquors in coordination with state licenses and laws

(32) To grant licenses for any lawful purpose

(33) To regulate the carrying on within the city of all occupations which are of such a nature as to affect the public health or the good order of said city, or to disturb the public peace, and which are not prohibited by law.

(34) To restrain and provide for the punishment of vagrants, mendicants, prostitutes, and other disorderly persons;

(35) To provide for the punishment of all disorderly conduct, and make all regulations necessary for the preservation of public morality, health, peace, and good order within its limits

(36) To  extend its streets over any tidelands or harbor areas of the city

(37) To provide in their respective charters for a method to propose and adopt amendments thereto.

Revised Code of Washington 35.82.070

(1) To have legal powers and make and execute contracts to provide or assist in the provision of housing for persons of low income

(2) To prepare, carry out, acquire, lease and operate housing projects; to provide for the construction, reconstruction, improvement, alteration or repair of any housing project or any part thereof; to agree to rent or sell dwellings forming part of the projects to or for persons of low income.

(3) To acquire, lease, rent, sell, or otherwise dispose of any commercial space located in buildings or structures containing a housing project or projects.

(4) To arrange or contract for services and work in connection with, a housing project

(5) To lease or rent any dwellings, houses, accommodations, lands, buildings, structures or facilities embraced in any housing project and establish and revise the rents or charges therefor; to own or manage buildings containing a housing project or projects; to own, hold, and improve real or personal property; to buy and sell property (including use of eminent domain); to sell property at less than fair market value to another  government entity when such action assists the housing authority in carrying out its powers and purposes under this chapter, to a low-income person or family for the purpose of providing housing for that person or family, or to a nonprofit corporation provided the nonprofit corporation agrees to sell the property to a low-income person or family or to use the property for the provision of housing for persons of low income for at least twenty years; to insure property

(6) To invest reserve funds and purchase bonds.

(7) To investigate living, dwelling and housing conditions and the methods of improving such conditions; to determine where slum areas exist or where there is a shortage of decent, safe and sanitary dwelling accommodations for persons of low income; to make studies and recommendations relating to the problem of clearing, replanning and reconstructing of slum areas, and the problem of providing dwelling accommodations for persons of low income, and to cooperate with the city, the county, the state or any political subdivision thereof in action taken in connection with such problems; and to engage in research, studies and experimentation on the subject of housing.

(8) To conduct examinations and hear testimony under oath; to issue subpoenas requiring the attendance of witnesses or gathering of evidence; to make available to appropriate agencies its findings and recommendations with regard to any building or property where conditions exist which are dangerous to the public health, morals, safety or welfare.

(9) To initiate eviction proceedings against any tenant as provided by law.

(10) To exercise all or any part or combination of powers herein granted.

(11) To agree  to make payments in lieu of taxes as the authority finds consistent with the achievement of the purposes of this chapter.

(12) To exercise any powers of a community renewal agency under chapter 35.81 RCW

(13) To grow the boundaries of the housing authority district when requested by a city or county

(14) To administer contracts for assistance payments to persons of low income in accordance with section 8 of the United States Housing Act of 1937, as amended

(15) To sell any mortgage or other obligation held by the authority.

(16) To adjust interest rates and lending terms when consistent with bonds and obligations.

(17) To make or  acquire loans to persons of low income to enable them to acquire, construct, improve, lease, or refinance their dwellings.

(18) To make or acquire loans for the acquisition, construction, improvement, leasing, or refinancing of land, buildings, or developments for housing for persons of low income.

(19) To contract with a public authority or corporation, created by a county, city, or town under RCW 35.21.730through 35.21.755, to act as the developer for new housing projects or improvement of existing housing projects.