8/30/2022
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The Spokesman-Review
FRUSTRATED WEST HILLS RESIDENTS SOUND OFF ON QUALITY INN’S FUTURE
Councilman Cathcart pitches renewed conversation on homeless housing projects
KREM
The WASHINGTON POST
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The Spokesman-Review
FRUSTRATED WEST HILLS RESIDENTS SOUND OFF ON QUALITY INN’S FUTURE
By Greg Mason
THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW
A conference room at the Hampton Inn in west Spokane was filled beyond capacity Tuesday night with neighbors around Sunset Highway angry about homeless supportive housing projects that could impact their neighborhood.
Tensions were high during the community meeting that saw Mayor Nadine Woodward and representatives from Catholic Charities Eastern Washington field written and shouted questions on several issues. The chief among those is Catholic Charities’ plan to purchase and convert the Quality Inn on Sunset Highway into 87 rooms for 100 to 120 adults for what’s been called the “Catalyst Project.”
Catholic Charities is in the process of closing out a deal to buy the Quality Inn with funds from the state Commerce Department. Catalyst was one of several projects in the city of Spokane’s application for $24.3 million aimed at relocating people in the Camp Hope homeless encampment on state land in east Spokane.
Jonathan Mallahan, Catholic Charities’ chief housing officer, said Catholic Charities expects to close on the financing for property acquisition Sept. 12. He said Catholic Charities is anticipating an up to 20-year operating contract with the state.
That, and many of Catholic Charities’ responses, we’re met with boos, jeers, heckling and pleading from a crowd that, by and large, expressed feeling left behind by the process.
The city was required by Commerce to submit a proposal for Rights of Way funding within 30 days, which Woodward has said did not allow enough time for public engagement.
Meanwhile, Catholic Charities representatives have said they were contractually bound not to talk about the Quality Inn project, thereby hindering public outreach.
By the end of the meeting, there was talk of the West Hills Neighborhood Council possibly taking the matter to court.
“Here’s what Catholic Charities thinks is going to happen: that they’re going to buy the Quality Inn and we’re all going away,” said Donald “Gib” Brumback, president and founder of Brumback Inc., which neighbors the Quality Inn. “ ... I’m telling you, you live here, and I’m just sharing with you: Don’t go away.”
The Catalyst Project will not be a shelter, Catholic Charities Eastern WashingtonCEO Rob McCann emphasized in a video released Monday.
Catholic Charities has characterized Catalyst as an emergency supportive housing community. The center will not offer walkup services or serve as a walkup shelter; rather, residents will be selected through a referral process and careful screening, with priority to those ready to stabilize their lives, Mc-Cann said in his statement.
McCann said Catalyst will have 24/7 security and around 38 staffers, more than any other Catholic Charities housing complex of this size.
Catalyst will offer employment, vocational and life skill services on site, he said. Drugs and alcohol use will not be permitted in or around the Catalyst Project, Catholic Charities says.
“It is not a low-barrier shelter,” said the organization’s Chief Stabilization Officer Dawn Kinder, referencing those facilities that do not require sobriety of guests.
McCann said in his statement anyone who does not meet Catholic Charities’ rules or expectations will be removed.
“This is a moment for our community to embrace strong leadership, the concept of the common good, compassion and common sense,” he said. “We have a homelessness and housing crisis in our region. Catholic Charities is willing to lean into that crisis and help solve it.”
McCann did not speak during Tuesday’s meeting, with Mallahan and Kinder fielding questions.
“I think we have accepted as a community that sometimes, the interests of the marginalized need to be raised up and take precedent,” Mallahan said.
One of the big questions from neighbors: Is it a done deal?
Mallahan re-emphasized the expected closing date for financing. Woodward told neighbors to contact state Commerce Director Lisa Brown.
“I think you need to be talking to the Commerce Department,” Woodward said. “I want to talk to Commerce about this. This was a sloppy, messy deal.”
The Catalyst Project is just one homeless housing project West Hills residents have heard about that, they believe, could impact their neighborhood.
Another, proposed by the Empire Health Foundation in the city’s Rights of Way funding application, calls for 75 tiny home-like units for 125 residents, on 3 acres of foundation-owned land along Sunset Highway. Greg Mason can be reached at (509) 459-5047 or gregm@spokesman.com.
Joseph Montes, who lives near the proposed homeless shelter atop Sunset Hill, voices his frustration about Catholic Charities’ plan to transform the Quality Inn into emergency supportive housing on Tuesday evening during an over-capacity community meeting at the Hampton Inn.
COLIN MULVANY/ THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW
Councilman Cathcart pitches renewed conversation on homeless housing projects
By Greg Mason
THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW
Backlash against plans to transform a Sunset Highway hotel into emergency housing has a few Spokane City Council members interested in reopening talks about how to spend state funding on efforts to relocate people out of an east Spokane tent city.
The city submitted a series of proposals last month to the state Department of Commerce, which has offered approximately $24.3 million through the state’s Rights of Way initiative to support solutions for relocating the hundreds in the encampment on state land, also known as Camp Hope.
To date, the Department of Commerce has only committed to funding two components of the spending proposal. One of those is Catholic Charities Eastern Washington’s plans, dubbed the Catalyst Project, to purchase the Quality Inn on Sunset Highway to house 100 to 120 adults not as a walkup shelter, but through referral from local community partners.
Over the last few weeks, however, the Spokane City Council has fielded numerous concerns from West Hills Neighborhood residents who, blindsided by the Quality Inn project, have expressed concerns about that and other proposed homeless housing initiatives for that area.
In light of those concerns, Councilman Michael Cathcart drafted a letter asking the Department of Commerce to “reopen” Spokane’s Rights of Way funding discussion “to ensure all voices are heard,” according to the letter.
The draft was brought forward Monday by Cathcart for discussion during the council’s Public Safety and Community Health meeting.
Asked what these discussions would look like, Cathcart said Tuesday he envisions two different meetings to start, preferably in public: one with the City Council, mayor, Department of Commerce, local providers and neighborhood representatives; and another with the council, mayor, Commerce and representatives from surrounding jurisdictions on a regional approach.
“I’m not necessarily asking anything stops, comes to a halt. I don’t think there’s any language in the letter that says that,” Cathcart said, “but, really, just let’s have a conversation.”
The Department of Commerce issued a response to Cathcart’s letter, saying community members should continue to express their concerns on the city’s Rights of Way plan with city and county officials.
“Commerce will continue to be at the table with local leaders on the plan put forward by the city. Spokane County, unfortunately, has not engaged with us,” officials said in the statement. “It’s worth reminding that this is a statewide public safety initiative. The process of cleaning up and successfully relocating people to better, safer housing options is underway in other counties as well.”
The letter is not representative of the entire City Council, nor would it go through a traditional pass/ fail process, Cathcart said. Rather, council members would have the opportunity to sign onto the letter.
Cathcart said he hopes the reopened discussion on the Rights of Way funding would include council members, representatives from any and all neighborhoods that might be impacted and service providers. He also envisions these talks as a “regional conversation,” saying the issues involving Camp Hope are not the city’s alone. Cathcart is the Republican candidate in the Spokane County District 2 commissioner’s race in Novemember.
“Most importantly, I think we have heard a lot of concerns from folks who don’t feel like they’re being heard,” he said. “Not saying any outcomes would be guaranteed to change, but I think that they deserve a voice and I think that it makes sense that we reengage and have this broad-based conversation.”
Along with Cathcart, only Councilman Jonathan Bingle offered verbal support for the letter Monday.
Others sounded off with reservations.
“It feels a little disingenuous to ask for help, but say, ‘No, we don’t want that kind of help; we want it done this way,’ ” said Councilwoman Lori Kinnear. “Again, it puts the council squarely in the middle of something that’s very controversial.”
The Department of Commerce initially announced Spokane’s funding eligibility in June, setting a 10-day deadline for funding applications before later extending that to 30 days. Spokane County’s application was prepared in a coordinated effort by the city, county, Spokane Housing Authority and other public and private partners.
“Things had to move quickly, which is frustrating that 30 days is the timeline that we were given when probably more time should’ve been given to this discussion,” Bingle said.
Councilwoman Betsy Wilkerson said she doubts anything would change with another conversation.
“I don’t think there would be any other different outcomes than what there are now because that train has truly left the station and there’s no going back,” Wilkerson said. “The biggest challenge that we have as a city, council and administration, is making sure these people are getting the right information because the information out there is inflammatory.”
Councilwoman Karen Stratton said the issue is compounded by Catholic Charities Eastern Washington’s plans for “House of Charity 2.0” to relocate the current House of Charity to a larger campus outside of downtown Spokane.
House of Charity 2.0 was not included in the Rights of Way funding application. Likewise, the project is separate from the plans for the Quality Inn.
Around an hour after the council’s committee meeting Monday, Catholic Charities issued a news release stating the organization is expanding the search for the suitable 3- to 5-acre site for the House of Charity 2.0 campus.
Back when the project was announced during Mayor Nadine Woodward’s State of the City address in April, Catholic Charities CEO and President Rob McCann said the organization had three possible locations in mind.
Catholic Charities, which reportedly has been evaluating possible locations outside of downtown for nearly a year, decided to expand the search area to explore locations that “would be better suited to meet the individualized needs of those in our community facing homelessness,” the organization said in a statement.
Representatives said Catholic Charities is not at this time considering any sites owned by the organization for House of Charity 2.0.
“The ideal site for House of Charity 2.0 will be easy to access by a short bus ride with frequent service, have sufficient space to create a dignified and peaceful environment, and not located in a primarily residential neighborhood,” the statement read. “Our development team is working diligently to find possible locations throughout our region. We continue to explore possible locations and will publicize once a suitable site is selected.” Greg Mason can be reached at (509) 459-5047 or gregm@spokesman.com.
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KREM
KREM 2 spoke with some of the people living at the homeless encampment near I-90 and Freya, and the reaction to the new shelter was mixed.
SPOKANE, Wash. — After months of discussion, voting and zoning changes, the Trent Avenue homeless shelter is expected to open during the first week of September. However, the residents living at the homeless encampment near I-90 have mixed reactions to the decision.
The city of Spokane announced Monday that Guardians Foundation will serve as the operator of the shelter through December 2023. Leaders expect the shelter to be open by Tuesday, Sept. 6.
It is important to note that opening this new shelter does not mean the homeless encampment near I-90 and Freya will be cleared out immediately. It does mean, however, that the shelter space will be open to those who choose to go there.
The Trent Shelter will offer separate spaces for different demographics, along with showers, restrooms and three meals a day. There will also be services available to help transition people out of homelessness.
KREM 2 spoke with some of the people living at the homeless encampment near the freeway, and the reaction to the new shelter was mixed. Some believe the shelter will give them the stability and resources they have needed.
"I don't feel safe," encampment resident Tammy said. "So I would go to a controlled environment where I would be safe."
On the other side, others feel they have built a home at the camp and have no plans to leave.
"We planned on traveling. Just living out, seeing things and moving around," resident Danny said. "I don't want to be locked into one location."
In an interview with Spokane Mayor Nadine Woodward, she said there will be an end date for when people must vacate the homeless camp near I-90. The exact date is still being discussed.
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The WASHINGTON POST
The unhoused are often hidden. Seattle is testing a new method to find them.
Kyle SwensonAugust 24, 2022 at 7:00 a.m. EDT
Michelle and John Tirado had temporary jobs as security guards and lived in a trailer in a Seattle encampment. Michelle said it's not a home. “It’s a space where we survive,” she said. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post)
SEATTLE — Handwritten notes were everywhere, taped into car windows or tucked under windshield wipers or scrawled across van doors. They were public announcements and cryptic rants — tiny splashes of individuality amid the anonymity of garbage piles and ripped tarps surrounding the trailers and campers parked near the railroad tracks south of downtown.
“Sick sleeping do NOT wake up,” one on a camper said. “I have narcan spray,” said another. “DO NOT TOW MY HOME!” stated a third.
Toward the end of July, one more sign began appearing at the encampment. “Notice,” the warning from the city said. “Order to remove all personal property.” The area would be cleared July 26.
John and Michelle Tirado’s 17-foot trailer stood near a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. The windows inside were blocked so they could sleep for their evening shifts as security guards at an abandoned foundry, both temporary jobs with no benefits. They had been living in the encampment for four months. When they arrived, they were sleeping in their GMC Yukon, an SUV. Later the couple found the trailer on Facebook for $1,700 — better than sleeping in the car, and more affordable than the deposit and first and last month’s rent needed for an apartment. But the Tirados couldn’t help feeling that they were bobbing between bad and slightly better, while still on a general slide into worse.
“Some people would count that as a home, but it’s not,” Michelle, 33, said of the trailer they would soon have to move. “It’s a space where we survive.”
“We are homeless,” John, 32, said. “We hate it.”
Until last year, the federal government did not always include people like the Tirados or the others living in trailers within sight of the sun-polished towers of downtown Seattle in its annual tally of the homeless, a reflection of what advocates, academics and policymakers say is a flawed methodology that underlies billions in spending on homelessness.
Getting that figure right has gained new urgency as rising housing costs and a persistent shortage of affordable housing mean more people have fewer options when it comes to shelter. Tent cities now sprawl across sidewalks, along overpasses and over green spaces in many major American cities. The visibility of homelessness has triggered a wave of municipal and state laws criminalizing it. Advocates also say violent confrontations between the housed and unhoused appear to have increased.
At the local, state and federal level, governments rely on annual estimates of the homeless population to direct billions of dollars in spending. But few advocates, academics or public officials believe those estimates are accurate. Compiled by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), they are technocratic best-guesses, hammered together using a handful of methods many believe are inadequate.
“It gives Congress a false picture of the true magnitude of the problem,” said Donald Whitehead, executive director of the National Coalition for the Homeless. “We need to have accurate data if we are going to provide accurate solutions.”
For years, advocates have pushed the government to improve the annual count by broadening the official definition of homelessness and adopting new methods to count unsheltered populations. There are a number of proposals circulating. Until recently they have mostly been theoretical. Then, earlier this year in Seattle, the King County Regional Homelessness Authority (KCRHA) decided to field-test a new method, which combined policy wonks and street organizers to capture populations that had been missed in HUD’s Point-In-Time (PIT) count, a key component of the federal government’s homeless population estimate.
HUD spokeswoman Shantae Goodloe acknowledged the difficulties inherent in the undertaking but defended the agency’s methods.
“Given this monumental task, it is likely that communities do not find every single person experiencing homelessness, but we are confident they identify most people, and this consistent counting effort allows an analysis of trends from year to year that help us gauge whether homelessness is rising or falling across the country,” Goodloe said. “The PIT count data is the only data source that collects data on our unsheltered population across the entire country.”
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Goodloe also noted that there are support programs for families regardless of whether they fall into the official definition of homelessness. “Expanding the homeless definition does not resolve the reality that there are simply not enough resources for the high demand for people who live in precarious housing situations,” she said.
For the Tirados, the gap between policy and reality has meant painful choices.
As they spent their last nights at the encampment, they had no idea where they would go next. They did, however, know that they would not be joining their five children and John’s mother and sister at a local homeless shelter. When the family had arrived in Seattle, there were not enough beds for everyone to stay together at the facility. They had been split ever since and would remain apart until the Tirados found a place big enough that they could afford.
On a Saturday morning in July, Marvin Futrell, 57, wheeled his car down the narrow lane where the Tirados’ trailer was parked. Around 55 other campers and RVs filled the street. He was doing his own informal count.
“Let’s just say one person lives in each. That’s 55 displaced people and probably more living in each one,” Futrell said as he rolled by the encampment. “But the system doesn’t recognize folks living in RVs as homeless.” He then glanced back at the image of the RV encampment shrinking in his rearview mirror. “The response that we have now isn’t enough.”
Futrell kept a map in his head of Seattle and King County, a shifting picture of where people without homes tended to gather. Some were places he’d spent the night himself during his years living on the streets. Other were floating communities he had come to know as an organizer, camps and tiny-house villages he had helped avoid police sweeps or wage legal battles with the city. Those experiences had now landed Futrell a position with the county’s homelessness response.
“We’re not treating an emergency like an emergency,” he said. “My work is to start treating this housing emergency like an emergency.”
He sees a more accurate count of the city’s unhoused as vital to any solution, but for more than a decade governments have relied in part on HUD’s Point-In-Time count, an annual tally of homeless people each year during one night in the last week of January. Volunteers and outreach workers walk the streets and count the number of unsheltered homeless individuals they spot. The results are combined with the total population of a region’s homeless shelters, as well as data from a region’s homeless management information system, a database that tracks services delivered to individuals experiencing homelessness. Other government agencies, such as the U.S. Census Bureau and the Education Department, also track homelessness, but HUD’s data is considered authoritative.
Congress approves and funnels out the majority of the country’s financial response to homelessness on the basis of these numbers. The PIT count was inaugurated in 2007 in part to see whether the federal government’s money was making an impact.
Over time, however, academics and advocates have criticized HUD’s approach. “The HUD data is just catching a fraction of the people,” said Samuel Carlson, the manager of research and outreach at the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless.
“It’s not the best measure, because it’s a count on one night only. But also communities end up doing it all different ways; there is not a standardized way,” said Jack Tsai, a professor and dean of the University of Texas School of Public Health in San Antonio, who has written on the topic. “We don’t even look at the per capita or proportion of the total community that is unsheltered. But this is the main benchmark we use every year.”
Some of the most pointed criticism about HUD’s methodology comes from a 2021 review by the U.S. Government Accountability Office, which knocked the department for not providing local entities with examples of how to properly use data to supplement the PIT count. A 2020 GAO report found HUD does not “closely examine” the methodologies local entities are using to produce their counts, leading to confusion and inconsistencies between various agencies and general “questions about data accuracy.”
Since the GAO report, “HUD has published resources to assist communities with their sampling efforts and is in the process of working on additional resources to help communities conduct more accurate counts,” Goodloe said.
King County officials realized they were missing thousands of homeless individuals in their region when they began an overhaul of countywide data in 2018. They found a substantial gap between traditional homeless counts and the number of people who identified themselves as homeless when entering either the local homeless health-care network or the county’s Behavioral Health and Recovery Division.
Inflation is making homelessness worse
By comparing various databases, they found that 40,800 of the county’s total 2.2 million residents experienced homelessness at some point in 2020. Before the new analysis, the county had estimated that figure to be 33,500 based on data from its Homeless Management Information System. The PIT count total for 2020 was 11,751.
The report also determined that 7,300 people in the county who were experiencing homelessness had accessed county behavioral health or homeless health-care systems but were left out of the other databases.
Finding the people the survey missed became the mission of the KCRHA, which began operating in mid-2021 as a regional solution to what had long been a contentious local issue. The upheaval of the pandemic opened a door for a new approach, said Marc Dones, the authority’s chief executive.
“There are real methods. There are real ways to do this,” Dones said. “Asking people to go out on a night in January and be like, ‘I thought I saw a person in a tent’ is not a method.”
‘Soon we’ll be back together’
Michelle Tirado sat on the ground twisting a jack that was propping the trailer up. She and her husband were preparing to leave the encampment ahead of the July 26 sweep. She strained against the metal, her red-dyed hair flashing in the dull sun. The couple would need to move soon, and the encampment was chaotic as others prepared to do the same.
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The Tirados had arrived in Seattle in spring after living on a relative’s property in a nearby county. The family included the five children — ages 3 to 11 years old — John’s mother and his grown sister, who is disabled. Once the relative passed away, all nine headed to Seattle to find work. When they couldn’t immediately secure housing, the children and John’s mother and sister went to a local shelter, and John and Michelle Tirado hit the streets. Even after landing jobs working security at $15.50 an hour, they couldn’t put together the needed funds for rent.
“We’re trying everything we can to move forward, but it’s so tough with a family of nine,” John Tirado said. “The thing that I hate the most is that we put in a lot of hours at work so we can afford to get a place, so we will be able to afford rent. But you have to make like three times the rent, and have first and last deposit. It’s hard.”
By the end of July, being separated from their children was beginning to wear them down.
“I’m used to doing the mom thing; I’m used to cooking the kids’ meals,” Michelle Tirado said. The most difficult part was trying to explain the situation to them without letting on how desperate the circumstances were. “We say that it’s a journey that we’re all on and that soon we’ll be back together,” she said.
Their plan to move the RV away from the encampment ran aground when, as they were moving it, the axle snapped, rendering the vehicle essentially useless.
Rather than return to sleeping in the car, John and Michelle moved in with a friend until they decided what to do next.
‘Where are you sleeping?’
The key challenge with counting the members of a homeless population is that it is a community that often prefers not to be noticed.
The method Dones and the team set out to create aimed to be both a head count and a megaphone, quantitative numeration fused with an opportunity to record testimonies from the homeless community.
Their Maryland apartments were deteriorating. Then the rent went up.
The KCRHA’s team settled on a plan to set up 10 hubs at locations across the region, from libraries to food banks to health clinics. A handful of volunteers at each hub would be responsible for taking subjects through a series of questions about their experiences with homelessness:
During this time, what things or people have been helpful to you?
During this time, what things or people have not been helpful — or may have been harmful — to you?
Dones wanted the findings to be bulletproof to any criticism. The team estimated it needed at least 500 interviews from members of “historically marginalized communities who are not believed.”
Futrell sat in on the early planning meetings for the new count. He suggested where the hubs could go to best capture the rhythms of homelessness in the area. And he had a further suggestion that would help make or break the experiment: Staff the hubs not with just any volunteers, but people also experiencing homelessness.
More determined than hopeful
In March, the KCRHA team began conducting the new surveys across the county.
“Where are you sleeping?” they asked at a public library.
“How has your health affected your living situation?” they asked at a food bank. “How has your living situation affected your health?”
“How do you earn money now?” they asked at a young-adult shelter.
Alex Finch, 31, was staffing one of the hubs near the airport. He had been homeless for a handful of years, living in tent encampments and now in a Seattle tiny-house village. He volunteered as part of the KCRHA’s new homeless count because “I wanted to be one of the people keeping them honest,” he said.
But even Finch was surprised by what he was told. “Most of the complaints that I heard were attacks by people who were housed,” he said. “I talked with someone who had their RV assaulted with urine bottles. Another was the victim of attempted arson.”
Finch also said that it was clear many people he interviewed had not been counted in earlier PIT estimates. It was a realization shared by many who helped run the survey. They found that the new methodology helped coax people out of hiding.
“I interviewed people who actually lived in the woods,” said Owen Kajfasz, the KCRHA’s deputy chief community impact officer. “We were able to count people who literally were telling me, ‘I’ve never talked with anybody who works in homeless services before.’ ”
The new landlord was going to nearly double the rent. These Maryland seniors decided to fight back.
The volunteers also found that many people they interviewed were experiencing homelessness for the first time, including seniors who had maxed out their savings and could not pay Seattle’s spiking housing costs. Others were eager for the opportunity to record their stories.
“What the method told us alone is that there are a lot more people who want to be seen and be heard than the previous methodology allowed for,” Dones said.
Using the data collected from the surveys, the KCRHA was able to submit a number to HUD for its homelessness count — 13,368, compared with 11,751, the Point-In-Time count total for 2020.
Dones is confident the new methodology not only produces a more accurate numerical understanding of the homeless community, but also a vast bank of stories attesting to the experience of homelessness. The KCRHA will release a detailed analysis this fall.
No method is perfect, though. And two testimonies that will be missing from that new store of knowledge are those of John and Michelle Tirado.
The couple never made it to a hub to be interviewed and soon will be quitting King County altogether. They plan on pushing east, over the mountains cupping the Seattle area, to look for work.
“I wouldn’t say we’re hopeful. It’s more that we are determined,” John Tirado said. “If we haven’t failed yet, we refuse to start now.”
The goal is to get jobs, save money for housing, then bring the five kids and John’s mother and sister to wherever they land, be a family again. Until then, the couple will be living in a tent.
Story editing by Annys Shin. Photo editing by Mark Miller. Copy editing by Susan Doyle. Design by J.C. Reed.