
Homeless in Seattle: The roots of a crisis - erentz
http://features.crosscut.com/homeless-in-seattle-the-roots-of-a-crisis?platform=hootsuite
======
jmspring
In a few of the threads, the mention of SROs and need for housing come up.
Gentrification, affordable housing, etc.

But, one question I fail to see answered well is, why should a city that isn't
affordable be required to find and provide housing for individuals in said
city? I can't afford to live in Carmel, Los Altos, etc, but I live where I can
afford.

California has places like Modesto, Stockton, etc. that have available housing
that is not expensive. I'm sure there are places in rural washington as well.
Why not have the city partner with neighboring (affordable) municipalities and
establish housing, maybe jobs and recovery programs, etc. at a fraction of the
cost of trying to wedge the same into places like Seattle or Washington?

A UC Santa Cruz / Civinomics study for homeless in Santa Cruz found roughly
2/3 of the individuals arrived here either on the edge or already homeless.

At what point do municipalities say "enough" and put their own first? I have
friends locally going back generations that can't afford to live here and
move, yet I am told that someone living in their RV has every right to camp on
the street and demand local services, yet arrived here recently.

~~~
intopieces
> I can't afford to live in Carmel, Los Altos, etc, but I live where I can
> afford.

Have you ever considered that maybe you should be able to afford to live in
those places? That the wealthiest nation in the history of humanity ought to
cultivate a society that encourages freedom of movement? That cordoning off
sections exclusively for the rich leads to a decrease in empathy for the less
fortunate? That safe housing and access to the amenities of a city ought not
to be exclusively for those who happened to have the lucky combination of
skills and money?

Have you considered that the people you hope to exclude are people no
different from you?

~~~
jmspring
My inlaws are from a part of Germany where I could buy a 60 square meter
apartment for cash without really thinking about it (low 5 figures), my truck
cost more. A similar sized apartment in Munich would be probably be at least
20x the cost.

Should I expect the city of Munich to provide such a unit at a similar cost to
the country side 3 hours away? No.

No, I do not think every municipality has the requirement to provide
affordable housing to everyone that has a desire to be there.

Do I think regions need to do better at providing a balance of housing to
accommodate the spectrum of people working jobs in the area? Yes. But should a
single municipality be expected to accept everyone wanting to be there at a
price that individual can afford? No.

In the case of individuals (there are many in Santa Cruz) that don't want to
work, want to live the way they want, and have done nothing for the community,
the community has every right to say "no".

------
joeblau
This is very interesting. I recently moved from San Francisco to Pittsburgh
and I've noticed that there aren't as many homeless people in this city
(Although to be fair; Coming from San Francisco, I feel you can say that about
almost any major city in the US). Two things that do exist in Pittsburgh are a
ton abandoned homes as well as a declining city population[1]. If the pattern
of what is described in these articles are true, I'm wondering if some of the
city residents are taking advantage of old buildings as dwellings?

What also throws another question my curiosity is that the city of Pittsburgh
a number of tax abatement programs to spur on growth to rebuild many areas.
I'm wondering if these programs will trigger a similar effects as the orders
put in place in Seattle?

[1] -
[https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=kf7tgg1uo9ude_#...](https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=kf7tgg1uo9ude_#!ctype=l&strail=false&bcs=d&nselm=h&met_y=population&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=country&idim=place:4261000&ifdim=country&tstart=646977600000&tend=1404360000000&hl=en_US&dl=en_US&ind=false)

~~~
munificent
> Pittsburgh and I've noticed that there aren't as many homeless people in
> this city

The sounds callous, but part of it is the climate. Winters in Seattle rarely
get below freezing, which means the truly homeless can still survive here even
when sleeping outside. Most Midwestern or Atlantic Seaboard cities are just
too cold during the winter, so Seattle gets a disproportionate number of
homeless.

~~~
brianwawok
Man those homeless guys in Chicago.... they are tough. Few blankets and
sleeping under the overpass. I think the worst few nights they pull most into
shelters , but plenty sleep there when it is 20F outside.

That said if I ever want to be homeless its SF or Hawaii.

~~~
hueving
SF weather sucks compared to the south bay, socal, Hawaii, or even central
cali. Weather is surprisingly not that important to homeless people.

------
ben_jones
Do we give homeless people money to help them or because we want them to go
away?

I feel like society puts up a facade of "social justice" trying to help the
homeless with one arm while taking away from them and dehumanizing them with
the other. Some examples of taking away from them: health care and criminal
laws that indirectly make their lives harder over time, the VA, and societies
continued criminalizing views on mental health issues such as substance abuse.

------
habosa
Pardon my threadjacking, but I know a lot of people reading this are in the SF
Bay Area and would like to do something to help with SF's homelessness problem
(which is similar in scale to Seattle's).

Consider a donation to a local organization like Larkin Street Youth Services
([http://larkinstreetyouth.org/](http://larkinstreetyouth.org/)). It's not
just a band-aid, these organizations can actually turn life around for a
homeless person and help people get off the streets for good. There are
~10,000 homeless people in San Francisco. It's a huge number, but there is
more than enough money in this city for private citizens to do something about
it. You don't have to wait for politicians to think up a plan.

------
smaili
_At last count, there were 4,500 people living on the streets of Seattle and
King County. It wasn’t always this way_

Couldn't this be said about San Francisco, New York, and every other major
city? Homelessness is certainly an issue in Seattle, but I would be more
interested to look at it holistically and what as a country and world we can
do to help solve this problem.

~~~
giaour
My understanding is that the homelessness crisis facing Seattle is more
pronounced and more rapidly worsening than similar issues in other major urban
areas. I recently relocated to Seattle from New York and never saw anything
like Seattle's tent cities and encampments back in Manhattan.

~~~
thematt
It is rapidly getting worse. It doesn't help that many cities are shipping
their homeless people to Seattle. Literally buying them bus tickets.

[http://www.kiro7.com/news/local/portland-begins-sending-
home...](http://www.kiro7.com/news/local/portland-begins-sending-homeless-
people-to-other-cities-including-seattle/296353382)

~~~
RhodesianHunter
> Literally buying them bus tickets.

This is one of those stories that I've heard or read everywhere I've lived or
been (Austin, Honolulu, Seattle, San Fran) that I just assume it's an urban
legend used to obfuscate the real issues.

------
techsupporter
I live in Seattle. I also live in one of the "lesser" areas of the city.

One of the things that frustrates me the most about our local homeless crisis
--if that's what it is, or maybe it's just become more visible--is how lacking
the regional response to it is. Seattle seems to be the only city in the north
King County/south Snohomish County area that is actually trying to do anything
about homelessness versus shuffling the problem off to another city.

This is frustrating for two reasons: one, it puts all of the burden on the
backs of the Seattle taxpayers. All the surrounding 'burbs need to do is come
up with enough to pay their police departments to round up the
"troublemakers"\--because that's usually how someone sleeping on a bench in
Bellevue or Redmond[0] is deemed--and then ship them off to the King County
Jail, conveniently located in downtown Seattle. Once the "miscreant" (in
quotes because, usually, their only crime is sleeping on a bench or maybe
smelling of pot) sleeps it off, that person walks out into the drizzly
daylight of now being in Seattle, so he or she heads to Pioneer Square or
Ballard or Lake City or Rainier Valley and begins anew.

Two, and this is where I get selfish, as a result of this the suburbs "get to"
(more like create a situation) enjoy things like clean parks, outdoor bathroom
facilities that aren't overused to the point of despair, streets and other
public spaces unencumbered by tents and other makeshift encampments...all the
while, their residents cluck their tongues about how dirty and run down and
depressing Seattle is and aren't their cities so much nicer for not having all
of the street people around? But Seattle, for all of the money we residents
pour into housing programs and social services, are the _bad people_ if we try
to insist that tents not be located on public property or broken-down RVs move
every 72 hours.

To continue my rant, speaking of money we pour into all of these things, now I
turn to what I've been told by homeless people and their advocates about our
broken shelter system. A big problem is that such services are concentrated
into a couple of small areas (Pioneer Square and Ballard) and there's neither
the funding nor the will to integrate them into surrounding neighborhoods so
any new siting proposal meets significant resistance. On top of that, our
shelters are unattractive for a laundry list of reasons (security,
insufficient storage for personal goods, deliberately separating couples into
same-sex housing, disallowing pets) that, while are good for efficient
operation of dormitories, don't account for the humans who are trying to exist
--or choosing not to exist--in them.

So yeah, it's frustrating all the way around, for the housed and the unhoused.
While I'll still vote yes on the housing levy in August--because what does
voting no accomplish? Cuts in public services to those who need it most and no
impetus to build better facilities--I wish our response, our _regional_
response would be better.

0 - I pick on Bellevue and Redmond but they're not the only ones, just the
most recent target of my ire. Shoreline, Lake Forest Park, Kirkland, Bothell,
Kenmore, Woodinville...they're all just as complicit in "oh no, we can't
possibly build any more public facilities but if you dare take a nap on the
grass in one of our parks off to 5th and James you go."

~~~
jmspring
As someone who lives in Santa Cruz, CA and is in Seattle/Kirkland/Redmond with
regularity, honestly, being able to go to a park, sit down and not run the
risk of someone mentally ill screaming at you, trash and human waste strewn
about or needles, really is a treat.

I've seen the camps along the highways when driving from the airport and
heading north. It is a problem.

Big cities (especially on the west coast), as mentioned in other threads, have
a problem with homelessness. SF has reported numbers around 6600 for a city of
850k, Santa Cruz reported about 3500 for a city of 60k.

The problem here isn't just homelessness, but acceptance of bad behaviors and
almost no penalties for crimes committed by those without means -- citations
are ignored, many arrests are catch and release.

I don't know what the solution is, but as someone living in a city with severe
issues and no will to change it, I enjoy visiting some of those places
mentioned on the east side.

~~~
RickS
> The problem here isn't just homelessness, but acceptance of bad behaviors
> and almost no penalties for crimes committed by those without means --
> citations are ignored, many arrests are catch and release.

I couldn't agree more. I wish this opinion were more widely held. Yes, we
should work to create social programs that help people who have nothing. Yes,
these people are hurting enough and it's sad to just pile on the trouble.

But we encourage this behavior every time we allow it to happen with no
consequences. There's a guy who's been living in a tent on my block on Folsom
longer than I've been living in my apartment. What the fuck? The police don't
care when I call, even though there are laws in place about this. I'm a
monster if I walk over there and rip it down.

There need to be consequences, but how do you discourage someone who has
nothing? They're almost inherently unpunishable.

~~~
imauld
> But we encourage this behavior every time we allow it to happen with no
> consequences. There's a guy who's been living in a tent on my block on
> Folsom longer than I've been living in my apartment. What the fuck? The
> police don't care when I call, even though there are laws in place about
> this. I'm a monster if I walk over there and rip it down.

Yes, you are a monster if you rip down their home.

Encourage this behavior? How do we encourage homelessness by locking people up
for having nothing? Do you think by putting someone in jail or forcing someone
with most likely no income to pay a fine that it will all the sudden hit them
that homelessness might not be the best lifestyle?

These people are doing what they must to survive. Do some of them have mental
health or substance abuse issues? Probably, but the solution to those problems
isn't punitive. The sort of issues require counseling and access to health
care and most importantly shelter. Trying to combat homelessness by stepping
up police efforts (which brings in host of it's own problems) is short sighted
and wreaks of NIMBY-ism.

~~~
RickS
I haven't encouraged locking anybody up, or fining anybody. They don't care.
It doesn't work. I know. Please don't put words in my mouth.

"They're just doing what they must to survive" doesn't justify the street
behavior of san francisco vagrants any more than it justifies a hungry dog
ripping the face off a kid.

Do you live in a neighborhood where you deal with the homeless and mentally
ill on a daily basis and at all hours?

Do you step in shit? Are you spit on? Accosted? Have your roommates come home
with phlegm and spit in their hair? Have you left your apartment to find a
man's face pressed against the window, yelling "You look like you've been
waiting to eat my ass your whole life"?

I'd need a yard to put the Y in NIMBY, but all I have is a feces-caked grate
that I routinely kick people off of so I can open the door and get into a
street that stinks of piss. Sorry if you're bummed that I'm interrupting their
pill sales.

Live and let live doesn't cut it here, not for me. The idea that these people
should be left alone regardless of the blight and destruction they cause to
public spaces is short sighted and wreaks of "I don't actually experience this
problem".

The homeless are struggling. They need help. But they're a scourge, too, and
I'm sick and tired of people boo-hooing about how they're just trying to
survive as the streets in this city rot from their presence, as though their
being in pain makes it acceptable that they erode the quality of every public
space in the city. It is not acceptable.

The solutions we have for homelessness and its associated ailments are weak,
and need to be better. They need to be rooted in generosity and upward
mobility. I completely agree. I'm all for huge city spending on building, and
on every conceivable social program, especially for mental health.

What I am not for is turning a blind eye to the realities of homelessness'
effects on the city in the mean time, and to distance the crimes and
destruction from the individuals who commit them.

You do not get a free pass to fuck up the world because your life sucks.

~~~
npizzolato
> I haven't encouraged locking anybody up, or fining anybody.

Well, you encouraged "consequences," which usually means one of those two
things.

> But we encourage this behavior every time we allow it to happen with no
> consequences... There need to be consequences, but how do you discourage
> someone who has nothing? They're almost inherently unpunishable.

So, there need to be consequences, but you don't agree with locking people up
or fining them? What consequences were you referring to then?

~~~
RickS
I have no idea, and that's what makes it difficult. It's the purpose of the
sentence you quoted.

Consequences are almost always about losing something, and you have to have
something to lose it, so you can't punish those who have nothing.

This creates a bizzaro nightmare scenario where the destitute can commit petty
crimes with impunity.

I won't pretend to have a solution to this. So far, I'm not sure anybody does.

But that doesn't mean I can't be mad as hell about it. I'm sick of people
saying that how people act in the streets here is somehow short of
reprehensible.

~~~
yazaddaruvala
One potential solution I've been pondering:

Send like 4000 homeless people to a small abandoned town (like old dead mining
towns and such), with gear and supplies, such that they can help each other
create themselves a society, simultaneously they might revive the abandoned
town. If they then choose to leave, they leave. If they choose to stay they
stay.

Not everyone needs to be assimilated, and _us_ building services to help
_them_ "be successful", is the literal meaning of assimilation. Kinda like a
commune or an Amish village, potentially even burning man, allow them to build
themselves the society such that they are successfully able to live in.

P.S. I don't have particularly good ideas about how you keep them safe, or
even if you should. It should be their society and maybe that means, allow
them to make their own laws.

P.P.S. I know I'm crazy.

~~~
strait
Not impossible, but as a proposed government-sponsored program in this day and
age, impossible.

------
VLM
Coming soon to a demographic group near you. Homelessness, not just for day
laborers and factory employees anymore.

People ask what our plan will be when middle class jobs are eliminated by
automation and robots. As if things can't happen without a plan. And a good
plan at that. Well, lack of plan never stopped anything in the 70s.

~~~
tomjen3
Why not retry the work progress administration? Worst case we will end up with
a bunch of cabins in national parks and a bunch of people who have learned
that they are not total failures but can, in fact, make something both of
themselves and their environment.

~~~
douche
This makes entirely too much sense. Bring back the CCC.

I had one of the better summers of my life doing something similar working for
an Appalachian trail club.

~~~
politician
This solution would immediately be denounced as a forced labor camp.

------
jknoepfler
I found this article to be very thin on data to support its thesis that:

a. there is a homeless crisis in Seattle in particular

b. this crisis was caused in part by a systematic erosion of infrastructural
support for affordable housing and mental health care.

For some background, there was a spike in the homeless count in the Seattle-
Tacoma area over the last three years ([http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-
news/politics/count-of-s...](http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-
news/politics/count-of-seattle-king-county-homeless-finds-4505-people-
sleeping-outside/)), but I don't know how noisy the data gathering technique
is (it sounds like it's super noisy), and I gather that the linked article
isn't talking about something that happened over the last three years.

I found the reports at
[http://www.endhomelessness.org](http://www.endhomelessness.org) (direct link
to 2016 report:
[http://www.endhomelessness.org/page/-/files/2016%20State%20O...](http://www.endhomelessness.org/page/-/files/2016%20State%20Of%20Homelessness.pdf))
to be very helpful to get a better quantitative view of homelessness. The 2015
report has comparative data by city. Seattle ranked 6th worst in terms of per
capita homeless rates, but I haven't found a good Seattle specific breakdown
of rates by demographic/cause over time yet.

The overall national (USA) trendline for homelessness is negative from
2007-2016. This is not at all to say that there isn't a problem (there is),
but I find the narrative of crisis (which implies something coming to a head,
reaching a point of no return, etc.) to be counterproductive. We have
systematic structural and infrastructural problems in the USA broadly and
Seattle, WA in particular that create unjust and inhumane conditions for a
significant percentage of the population. We're slowly getting better, but we
don't have very good safeguards against regressing, and we're not getting
better as quickly as we'd like. That's what a brief foray into the data says
(minus the evaluative bits).

Is there something that has caused a huge spike in homelessness in Seattle in
particular? I don't honestly know. Does it have deep roots in the erosion of
public support for homelessness? I don't know that either, but my tiny and
imperfect window into the data says "probably not."

Also interesting, the Seattle Human Services "Homeless Investment Analysis"
from 2015
([http://www.seattle.gov/Documents/Departments/HumanServices/R...](http://www.seattle.gov/Documents/Departments/HumanServices/Reports/HomelessInvestmentAnalysis.pdf)).
TL;DR "we're ramping up spending on the problem but it could be done better
and more efficiently."

~~~
jseliger
_I found this article to be very thin on data to support its thesis_

Yeah. I'm a grant writing consultant, and virtually every large municipality
has a group of organizations that receive HUD Continuum of Care funding to
deal with homelessness. There are problems with this system (see
[http://seliger.com/2012/11/11/huds-confusing-continuum-of-
ca...](http://seliger.com/2012/11/11/huds-confusing-continuum-of-care-coc-
program-explained/)) but it exists and the lack of even mentioning it is a red
flag.

I don't know about Seattle's specific situation because we haven't worked for
any of Seattle's CoC organizations or its public housing authority, but I do
know in general that a lot of funding for homelessness organizations exists.
(Seattle also has a powerful NIMBY lobby, which likely exacerbates
homelessness and drug treatment issues.)

There is a term, the name of which I forget, that is named for a physicist who
used to read the newspaper and who was always annoyed by the science
reporting, which got essential facts / ideas wrong. One day he realized that
if the newspaper was getting essential facts / ideas wrong about science, the
other sections probably weren't much better; he just didn't know enough about
the topics to know what was wrong. That's how I feel reading the article.

~~~
nilstycho
The Murray Gell–Mann Amnesia Effect, which was actually coined by Michael
Crichton.

