Two homeless encampments set up outside government buildings in Seattle are shutting down as a network of indoor shelters reopens. Advocates say their protest camps convinced King County and others to reinstate funding so they can move back inside.
Five months ago, the Seattle Housing and Resource Effort, a non-profit known as SHARE, set up tents on the plaza of the King County Administration Building and then outside another county building two blocks away.
SHARE board member Stu Tanquist says they used these highly visible, unsanctioned encampments as a protest that also provided makeshift housing.
“We were sheltering 150 to 200 people a night every night for the past five months, both on mats and in tents. We called that Tent City 6,” Tanquist said.
Tent City 7 emerged about a month later on a nearby lot known as Goat Hill.
Tanquist says they had to shut down the group’s longstanding network of indoor shelters after the county cut their funding. The cuts came on the heels of escalating debt and costs for new requirements such as the new $15 minimum wage and health insurance for staff.
Tanquist says the elimination of Metro Transit’s free-ride zone downtown added to their hardships. In the end, they racked up more than $70,000 in debt before they shut down 13 of their 15 indoor shelters, which are located all over the city.
But they’ve now reached an agreement with King County and the city of Seattle to reinstate enough funding to reopen. Tanquist says members of the City Council had been mentioning September as a goal for quite a while.
“And I think they realized that public opinion will turn when the weather changes and it gets cold and wet,” he said.
The agreement includes a partnership with Catholic Community Services and The Church Council of Greater Seattle, which will serve as financial backers. SHARE will also work with Seattle’s Low Income Housing Institute, which will provide voluntary case management to help SHARE’s homeless clients find more permanent housing solutions.
In the past, SHARE used a bare-bones model that did not include case management to keep costs low. But representatives say they welcome the assistance.
