Staff proposes removing 'rooming house' from code; co‑living standards to apply in multifamily areas
Summary
Staff recommended deleting the municipal-code term "rooming house" and relying on the state-mandated co-living housing category where multifamily development is allowed; commissioners discussed state law protections for single-family house arrangements.
Planning staff proposed deleting the older “rooming house” definition and related standards from the Anacortes municipal code and relying instead on the newer state-required co-living housing category in multifamily and higher-density zones. Libby Grage said the co-living definition closely tracks the uses formerly described as rooming houses, and that state law and the city’s multifamily provisions mean co-living should be permitted where multifamily is allowed.
Commissioners discussed how state law treats single-family houses and certain recovery or Oxford-style houses, noting that state protections can mean shared living in a single-family house is not subject to the same restrictions as an institutional group home. Grage said staff would remove the rooming-house term from the draft code and ensure other code references (including the word “boarder,” which only appears in the rooming-house definition) are cleaned up.
No vote to adopt text occurred Oct. 1; staff will revise the draft code to delete the rooming-house definition and related standards and return the edited draft in the Oct. 22 packet.
