This week, Microsoft's president and chief financial officer announced that the company is putting $500 million into an affordable housing initiative for residents in Seattle and its suburbs.
In a blog post entitled, "ensuring a healthy community: the need for affordable housing," company president Brad Smith and CFO Amy Hood explain that the funding will be separated into three "pillars": $225 million at lower-than-market-rate returns to subsidize the continuity and construction of middle-income housing in Bellevue, Issaquah, Kirkland, Redmond, Renton, and Sammamish; $250 million at market rate returns to support low-income housing in King County; $25 million in philanthropic grants to address Seattle's homelessness crisis, Fast Company reports.
If we’re going to make progress, we’ll all need to work together as a community. We recognize that Microsoft is in a unique position to put the size of its balance sheet behind this effort. But we believe that every individual and every business, large and small, has a responsibility to contribute. This includes new initiatives to share data on where jobs are being created and the home locations and commuting distances for employees. It also includes new work to develop the detailed public policy changes that will be needed to provide more affordable housing.
Ultimately, a healthy business needs to be part of a healthy community. And a healthy community must have housing that is within the economic reach of every part of the community, including the many dedicated people that provide the vital services on which we all rely.
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