Jenna McDevitt

CEP Class of 2015

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Table of Contents
Page 3 . Abstract
Page 4 . Product, Goal and Significance
Page 6 . Literature Review
Page 17 . Methodology
Page 20 . Findings and Recommendations
Page 22 . Conclusion
Page 23 . Appendix 1

Abstract
Seattle has an overwhelming homeless population and has struggled with this issue for
decades. Instead of improving over time, the amount of homeless people in the Seattle area
continues to rise in part due to new development and rising housing and living costs. In addition
to the rising costs of living, Seattle doesnt have adequate services to accommodate the growing
population of homeless people. In order to discover where the lack of housing, well-being, and
transitional services offered to the homeless community in Seattle are, I did extensive research to
develop an inventory of the services offered in Seattle as well as distributing electronic surveys
to homeless service providers to gauge where homeless services are deficient. I then provided a
written recommendation to the City of Seattle with suggestions for long-term and permanent
solutions, which were based off the results gathered from my research about Seattles services,
other citys methods, and surveys with local service providers. With these suggestions, the City
of Seattle can effectively work to permanently reduce the number of homeless people in turn
resulting in a more productive, cooperative, and satisfied community.

Product, Goal and Significance

This project addresses the overwhelming issue of homelessness in Seattle by finding the
gaps in the services provided to the homeless community in Seattle and recommending solutions
to fill those gaps. These recommendations will help keep the homeless community safe and
healthy as well as reduce the amount of homeless people in Seattle by making transitional
services and housing options more accessible. With over 109 resources available for the
homeless community in Seattle (Seattle.gov, Human Services Department), how do we still have
well over 7,000 homeless people living on the streets, in their cars, or migrating between shelters
each night? (homelessinfo.org). There is a gap in the services that aim to help the homeless
community, and this project uncovered what those gaps are, why they exist, and made
recommendations on how those gaps can be filled by looking at what other cities have done to
address the issue of homelessness.
This project is a culminating paper, presented in three parts. The first part presents the
current issues and gaps in the system as it stands in Seattle. This information was collected
through extensive research and interviews with service providers for the homeless in the Seattle
area. The second part explains what other cities, specifically Portland, Salt Lake City, and San
Francisco, have done to help solve the issue of homelessness by looking at various literatures
from cities around the world, comparing how different areas are handling the issue, where their
funding comes from, and how strict their laws and regulations are. The third and final section of
my paper is recommendations for the City of Seattle proposing how the gaps in the system can
be filled, supported by evidence from other citys success stories and methods.
My inspiration for this project first came when I was going to a Mariners game with my
family when I was around eight years old. A woman came up to my family and asked for money,
and I was so shocked that people did that. I asked my parents why she did that, and they said it
was because she didnt have any money and didnt have a job. It was my first interaction with a
homeless person that I can remember, since my hometown was a very suburban area and didnt
have a homeless presence. My next significant encounter with the homeless community came
when I was a junior at the University of Washington and I was working for Teen Feed, an
organization in the University District that provides general support and sets up meal programs
for homeless teens in the University District. This work was for a geography class with a service
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learning component. My project for the quarter was to create a resource binder for the Teen Feed
employees to be able to quickly reference when referring homeless teens to different resources.
While making this binder, I realized how many services for homeless people there are in Seattle,
but how much overlap there is. There are multiple meal programs on the same street, but no
shelters. There are plenty of job-finding services, but few companies able to help with getting
identification to make them eligible to work. There is a selection of shelters for teens under the
age of 25, but very few safe spaces for older males to go at night. Initially, my work with Teen
Feed led me to think that there were plenty of resources available, but upon further thought I
realized that there are many gaps in the system and there is a huge need for improvement in order
to ensure the safety and livelihood of the homeless community in Seattle.
In order to make this project as effective as possible in the given time constraints, I
decided to focus on reducing the number of homeless people in Seattle specifically. I would have
liked to expand and do a larger region, but given the nature of this project I thought that a more
in-depth report about a smaller area would be more effective than a general report about a larger
area of land. For my case study cities, I chose to look at Portland, Oregon, Salt Lake City, Utah,
and San Francisco, California. Portlands homeless situation is very similar to Seattles. With
similar weather conditions, Portlands homeless population has similar physical struggles to deal
with. They are also experiencing rising costs of living and a lack of cooperation with their local
government. Through looking at Portlands methods of helping their homeless population, I
hoped to find some new ideas that Seattle could adopt. Salt Lake City and San Francisco
implemented similar plans to end homelessness in 2004. Salt Lake City has been very successful
and San Francisco has not. This paper explains why Salt Lake City was more successful than San
Francisco and provides guidelines for Seattle based off of Salt Lake Citys success and San
Franciscos struggles.

Literature Review
People who live in the Seattle area are likely to see a homeless person on a regular basis.
There is talk of change, and has been for many years, but what should be done? That is the
question that is the essence of this project. Much of my research revolves around the details
regarding the homeless community in Seattle; resources that are available, how many people are
in need, and where we are lacking. I then compare this to what other cities have done. Utah has
claimed to have solved the issue of homelessness by decreasing their rate of homelessness by
74% since implementing their 10 year plan to end homelessness. Is this a model that Seattle
should follow? Is it viable? The following research, taken from news articles, statistical data, and
books seek to answer those questions. This literature review will begin by discussing why
homelessness became such a prominent issue in Seattle, followed by statistics reflecting the
homeless community in Seattle, the laws homeless people battle on a daily basis, and then
conclude with case studies of what other cities have done in order to help develop a goal for the
city of Seattle.
Factors Contributing to the Increasing Homeless Population
Many people think of homeless people as the poor people on the street corners begging
for money, but homelessness affects more people than most people realize. The National
Healthcare for the Homeless Council defines homelessness as lacking a fixed, regular, and
adequate nighttime residence. Homelessness in Seattle has been recognized for many years, but
the issue has not been improved. If anything, the likelihood of homelessness is rising. There is a
lack of safety nets to help ensure impoverished people stay above a certain poverty level. In his
book Gimme Shelter, Gregg Barak says It used to be that the rich were getting richer and the
poor were getting poorer. Nowadays, the rich are still getting richer and the poor are still getting
poorer, but there is a new axiom emerging; it seems that the so-called middle class is also getting
poorer (Barak 63). With prices rising and jobs requiring more experience and education, it is
becoming harder and harder for a person with an education but minimal job experience to get by.
In a study done by Chris Fitch, he found that being in debt can contribute to mental health
problems, which in turn result in poverty and low incomes (Fitch). The cost of getting a college
degree is such that many students are graduating with tens of thousands of dollars of debt, which
could lead to the mental health problems Fitch discusses. The One Night Count done in January
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of 2015 found that there was a 21% increase in the amount of homeless people outside in King
County from 2014 to 2015. Seattle has an overwhelming amount of homeless people when
compared to other cities its size. Only New York, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas have bigger
homeless populations than King County (Ryan-Kuow).
In the 2009 Homeless Needs Assessment for Seattle, 297 surveys were conducted. 90%
of individuals surveyed were interested in housing, but less than 30% were on a house waiting
list. This is supported by the Housing Affordability Crisis in King County document, which
states that when the Seattle Authority opened their waiting list for Section 8 Housing Vouchers in
April of 2008, they received nearly 12,000 applications. Due to the overwhelming amount of
applicants, the Housing Authority was unable to accept any additional applicants for four years
(The Housing Affordability Crisis in King County). Being able to afford housing in the King
County area is proving to be difficult for a significant portion of the population. In a study done
by King County, researchers gathered that 50% of all renters in King County cannot afford the
average rent for a two-bedroom apartment. Research confirms that more than one-third of all
renter households earn less than 40% of median income and can afford less than $670 in rent,
yet only 8% of all market-rate rental units are priced in that range (The Housing Affordability
Crisis in King County). Affordable housing is an obvious issue in Seattle, and is a major
contributor to the growing amount of homeless people.
Shelters and Accessibility to Other Services
While homelessness is a temporary situation for some, others arent as lucky and are
stuck on the streets or moving between shelters for many years with no resources to improve
their lifestyle. Seventy percent of the people surveyed for the 2009 Needs Assessment were
homeless for more than one year, with almost 25% of them being homeless for more than six
years. Those statistics show a huge need for an increase in public services. If one in four people
continue to be homeless for over six years, then that could be an indicator that there arent
enough support groups or that they arent widely accessible to the homeless community. 67% of
people surveyed reported learning of services through word of mouth or on the street, while only
10% learned of the services available from an agency or program. Accessibility has been
recognized as an issue in the United States. In 2010, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban
Development released a strategic plan for Improving Homeless Peoples Access to Mainstream
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Benefits and Services. The study identified three categories of obstacles hindering a homeless
persons accessibility to services. These three barriers are structural barriers (location,
organization, or what is required of applicants), capacity barriers (lack of available resources or
capped funding) and eligibility barriers (criteria prohibiting who can receive benefits which are
usually created at the federal level). In order to combat these roadblocks, different mechanisms
are put in place. Smoothing mechanisms are used to help diminish the structural barriers and
usually involve providing transportation, doing street outreach, and providing homeless-specific
facilities. Expanding mechanisms are used to increase capacity by gaining commitment from
additional resources, which could include allocation of federal funds or fundraising on a local
level. Changing mechanisms modify the eligibility standards of organizations which could, for
example, establish a priority for homeless clients. Measures like these are being encouraged
throughout the country by homeless advocates, but not all cities are following these guidelines
for improving accessibility. Designing programs and services with the homeless community in
mind is important to consider when dealing with cities with large homeless populations, such as
Seattle.
In the 2015 One Night Count, 2813 people were listed as homeless in Seattle, 9 of them
being children, 695 being men, and 165 being women. 1944 of the people documented in the
survey did not share their gender or their gender was unknown. This survey information was
collected at night, however, so there could be a much larger population of homeless people
staying in shelters that were not counted in this statistic. Even though there are many shelters in
the Seattle area, only 37% of people interviewed in the 2009 Needs Assessment reported staying
at a shelter during the last six months. The shelters quality varies, and while some are kept clean
and livable, others are dirty, dangerous, and undesirable to stay in. While there are many shelters
in Seattle, those are often at capacity and have to turn a large amount of homeless people away.
Is the answer to provide more shelter space, or to attempt to transition the homeless community
out of homelessness altogether with a more permanent solution? This question will be addressed
later in this literature review.
Although shelters are not used or always available to members of the Seattle homeless
community, the 2009 Needs Assessment did show that other homeless services were reportedly
used more than shelters. 70% of the people surveyed said they used a food bank, 48% reported
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using a meal program in the last six months, and 50% of people surveyed reported using a
hygiene facility. Health care was also a very sought after service. Of the 297 people interviewed
during the 2009 Needs Assessment, 60% of people reported health conditions that required
professional care. 36% of the interviewed homeless people were hospitalized in the last year,
35% reported mental health treatment in the last year, and 31% were taking medication. In a
study done by Bonnie Nickasch and Suzanne Marnocha, they found that there were four main
themes associated with lack of healthcare within the homeless community; Lack of attainment of
physical needs (shelter, food, hygiene), lack of affordability (excessive co-pays, no health
insurance, and inability to purchase medication/medical supplies prescribed by the healthcare
provider), lack of available resources (overcrowded community clinics, lack of transportation,
and lack of phone access), and lack of compassion of healthcare providers (stereotyping and
presumptions). This study took place in Wisconsin, but the situations of homeless people are
similar throughout the country. The four main themes identified are hindering the homeless
community from living healthily and prove that there are many gaps in the current homeless
system. More hygiene facilities need to be implemented, co-pays need to be reduced or
eliminated for those who cannot afford them, and there needs to be more access to these clinics
with the appropriate amount of staff to ensure they run efficiently.
Many people have a skewed perception of homeless people, thinking that they just sit
around and beg all day when in reality, 20% of the homeless interviewed reported that they were
working and an additional 42% reported that they were looking for work (2009 Needs
Assessment). David Snow and Leon Anderson explain why the homeless struggle to find work in
their book Down on Their Luck. Snow and Anderson identify the main reason that homeless
people have issues holding down a job: A disjunction between the employers expectation and
the realities of street life, such as clothing accessibility, access to hygienic resources, nowhere to
safely store clothing without it getting wrinkled or dirty, and very few toiletries. In a news article
written about a proposed hygiene facility for the Ballard neighborhood of Seattle, Justin Ingram,
a homeless man, says that he dreams of holding a job like he did in the past, but its hard to stay
clean. Not being able to clean yourself for months, wearing the same clothes for a month plus, it
wears on a person. And you dont want to be around other people as much (McNichols). While
Ballard residents are wary of the hygiene facility being passed by legislation, other
neighborhoods are major supporters of this idea. John Scholes, president and CEO of the
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Downtown Seattle Association, shared in this article that downtown currently houses 40% of the
citys subsidized housing units with over 100 human service agencies. Considering the actual
downtown area of Seattle takes up just 5% of the citys area, Scholes feels that it is time to
expand the services so that people can stop traveling from neighborhoods like West Seattle and
Ballard to seek services.
Laws Regarding the Homeless Community
Law enforcement has historically increased stress for homeless populations all over the
country, making their lives even more difficult. In an article discussing crime rates and the
homeless community, Kristen Brown states that cities have increasingly moved toward enacting
and enforcing laws that specifically criminalize homelessness in response to their concern about
the use of public spaces. Cities enact and enforce these criminal laws as quick-fix solutions to
remove homeless from sight, rather than addressing the underlying causes of homelessness
(Brown). In 1993, Seattle enacted a law that made it illegal to lie down or sit on a public
sidewalk, or on a blanket, chair, stool or other personal object on said sidewalk, between the
hours of 7:00am and 9:00pm in certain areas of the city. The homeless community fought back,
claiming that their ninth amendment rights were being violated. However, they lost their battle
because sitting or laying are not integral to, or commonly associated with, expression (Brown).
In an article written in 2014 by Terrance Heath, he shared how some cities are still acting out
violently against the homeless community: State representative Tom Bower began walking the
streets of Waikiki district with a sledgehammer, and smashing shopping carts used by homeless
people. Bower decided to take matters into his own hands literally. He also took to rousing
homeless people if he saw them sleeping at bus stops during the day (Heath). While this is not
common or typical behavior, it shows the lengths that people will go to act out against the
homeless population without seeing any legal consequences. However, on the opposite end of the
coin, had a homeless man acted the same way to a passerby on the street there likely would have
been a much different reaction. While homeless people still arent completely protected by the
laws or systems in place today, some actions have been taken to improve their civil liberty.
There are many acts that have been legislated since 1986, when the McKinney-Vento
Homeless Assistance Act was passed. This overarching act had many different components, one
of which being the Homeless Eligibility Clarification Act, which removed the permanent address
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laws making it near impossible for homeless people to gain access to programs such as
Supplemental Security Income, Aid to Families with Dependent Children, Veterans Benefits,
Food Stamps, and Medicaid. Along with this act also came the Homeless Housing Act, which
created the Emergency Shelter Grant program as well as access to transitional housing,
administered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Since the initial passing of
the acts in 1986, there has been 4 amendments which have expanded the amount of activities
approved and modified the distribution of funds. However, even the creators of these acts to aid
the homeless recognize that these are not solutions to the problems, only stepping stones to aid
the homeless on their quest to overcome the lack of jobs that pay a living wage, close to no
benefits for those who cannot work, minimal affordable housing, and limited access to
healthcare. (McKinney-Vento Act).
More recently than the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, in 2005 many cities
nation-wide implemented a 10 Year Plan to End Homelessness, Seattle being one of these
cities. In 2005, King County made the bold promise to end homelessness in 10 years. While the
rate of homelessness in Washington State has decreased during that time, the amount of people
living on the streets in the city of Seattle has risen consistently (Ryan-Kuow). The Bush
administration helped to fuel this project by requiring cities to create plans to help these
communities in need in order to keep getting federal dollars to help the homeless. As part of this
effort, close to 6,000 affordable housing units were built, which is third in the nation only to New
York and Los Angeles. As we can see from the statistics shared in this paper, it is obvious that
these efforts to end homelessness by 2015 were unsuccessful. Dan Brettler, chair member of the
Committee to End Homelessness, doesnt discount the work that the committee has done over
the past ten years. Brettler says Thousands of people have gotten a roof over their head. The
problem is theres been a significantly higher inbound flow of people coming into the homeless
cycle than we anticipated (Ryan-Kuow). Brettler blames this overwhelming increase in
homeless people on a broken economic structure, with a thriving G.D.P. (Gross Domestic
Product) but a rapid creation of poverty at the same time. However, Seattle isnt alone in this
issue, but other cities nation-wide dont see the same increase in homeless populations. Another
chair member, Vince Matulionis, suspects that the reason Seattles 10-year Plan was unsuccessful
is because it didnt focus enough on root causes, like the lack of affordable housing (RyanKuow). In 2014, Seattle earned the title of fastest growing city in the country. People are
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moving here without the knowledge or experience necessary to live in the expensive city that we
are, putting them at risk for homelessness. Another factor that contributed to the ineffectiveness
of the 10-Year Plan was their overall focus on providing permanent housing rather than shelter
beds. While thinking long-term is effective, building housing is an expensive and slow process.
Matulionis said that with the current homeless population we have now, it is going to be
impossible to build our way out of it. We first need to reduce the number of people becoming
homeless. The committee is now re-working their strategic plan and is requesting the support and
cooperation of other committees in order to create a more substantial and effective plan this time
around.
The statistics stated in this report reiterate the need to help reduce the growing number of
homeless people in Seattle. The issue of homeless is so multifaceted it is difficult to think of
solutions. The following section will look at what other cities have done to help solve the issues
of homelessness and use parts of other citys solutions to form a recommendation for the city of
Seattle.
Case Studies
Alternative ideas to help solve the issue of homelessness are appearing all over the
country. In order to see what methods are working and what methods arent as successful, I
decided to look at case studies to discover what other cities are doing that Seattle has not yet
adopted or effectively implemented. I chose three cities to focus on; Salt Lake City, Utah, San
Francisco, California, and Portland, Oregon. These three cities have gained the attention of the
media with their attempts to end homelessness, both positive and negative. I chose to look at Salt
Lake City because they have claimed to end homelessness. The following paragraphs will
explain how they have done this. I chose to look at San Francisco because they had the same
goals as Salt Lake City, but very different results. Like Seattle, their homeless situation has not
improved with the implementation of new plans to end homelessness. The following paragraphs
will compare Salt Lake Citys efforts with those of San Francisco to figure out what brings
success and what doesnt seem to be effective. Lastly, I will look at Portland because the
homeless people in Portland share a similar environment to Seattles homeless population.
Because of this similarity, Seattle can both learn what methods to implement as well as what
methods are effective.
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In the article Salt Lake City a Model for San Francisco on Homeless Solutions written
by Kevin Fagan, he compares the efforts of Salt Lake City and San Francisco. Both cities
implemented very similar 10-Year plans to end homelessness in 2004, but the results in the two
cities were drastically different. Fagan states that Salt Lake City is expected to end chronic
homelessness in the next year, by spending $20 million compared to San Franciscos $165
million. How do cities with vastly different expenditures have such different and backwards,
results? Fagan accounts much of the difference in cost of living and real estate prices, with San
Francisco drawing in much more of a crowd, and therefore more homeless people, than Salt
Lake City. Salt Lake City also has millions of dollars being donated towards the cause from the
Mormon Church, which drastically improves their efforts to end chronic homelessness. However,
there is credit to be given to Salt Lake City. When both cities implemented their strategic plans to
end homelessness, they each had about 3,000 people who were chronically homeless. In June of
2014, Salt Lake City was down to 400 people and San Francisco still has over 2,000 homeless
people on the streets.
While the above factors have helped Salt Lake Citys chances of ending homeless and
made it more difficult for San Francisco to be successful, Salt Lake Citys methods also had a lot
to do with their success. Their methods were developed to address the root of the problems that
contribute to homelessness, which they believe are a lack of affordable housing in a safe area and
adequate support to help both get these people off the street but also to keep them off the street.
The housing provided in Salt Lake City is clean, attractive, and in a safe part of town. There is
also on-site counseling provided to recovering homeless people to help with issues ranging from
mental illness to drug addiction to unemployment. The homes in Salt Lake City are in complexes
away from the busier parts of the city and are properties for its residents to be proud of.
In San Francisco, they have implemented almost 5,000 affordable housing units for their
homeless population, but they are not strategically placed in an area of town conducive to help
the homeless population stay off the streets and away from the influences that may have brought
them there in the first place. There are also fewer counselors on hand in San Francisco, resulting
in less attention given to the residents. The relationships between residents and the counselors are
often not as strong or personal because the counselors are often the property managers, leading to
strained relationships when rent isnt paid on time and other conflicts of the sort arise. Josh
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Bamberger, a main leader in San Franciscos efforts to create affordable housing, says You want
the chronically homeless people to walk into the supportive housing and say, Wow, I really want
to stay here.. The common denominator is creating better housing, making sure theres
enough counseling and getting all parties to cooperate. By getting all parties to cooperate,
Bamberger means the cooperation between business, nonprofit agencies, and the government.
The joint effort of all three of these entities is vital for the success of such efforts to end chronic
homelessness.
Like Salt Lake City and San Francisco, Portland also implemented a 10-year Plan to End
Homelessness in 2004. Like Seattle and San Francisco, Portland has also been unsuccessful in its
efforts. Their homeless count at the end of 2014 was the same as it was in 2007. While their
numbers arent rising, they are not getting better. In an article written by Anna Griffin in January
of 2015, she claims that Portland residents are friendlier towards homeless people than a lot of
other cities in the United States. Their main downfall is the availability of housing. Portland
faults their failure to successfully execute the 10-year plan to the 2008 recession. They were
prepared to handle the chronic homeless people who needed long term support, but were
unprepared to accommodate the population of people who just needed a little support after the
recession hit. The solution they had planned for wasnt relevant to this new population of
homeless people the city had one their streets. When the recession ended, there was a high
demand for housing, leading to rents that skyrocketed and unaffordable housing except for the
upper-middle class. Portland had plans to make housing more affordable, but the waitlist to get
rent assistance runs anywhere from six months to two years. While Portland was not as
successful as they hoped to be, they did have some successes. Their homeless population didnt
increase since implementing the 10-year plan like Seattles did. That is a success in itself.
According to the article written by Anna Griffin, close to 13,000 households have found
permanent housing. Nick Fish, a Portland Commissioner, says that blaming the 10-year plan for
the fact that we still have homelessness is like blaming the surgeon who treats you after a car
accident for not making a safer car. The surgeon had nothing to do with your car, he is just trying
to put you back together.
Alternative ideas to help solve the issue of homelessness are sprouting up all around the
country. Something that is quickly gaining support is the Tiny Home project. There are
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projects going on in Oregon, Texas, Wisconsin, California, New York and Olympia, Washington.
In Portland, Josh Alpert, the director of strategic initiatives, is looking at surplus land inventories
coming from TriMet, Portland Public Schools, and Multnomah County to provide suitable site
options for communities of tiny homes. They are looking into setting up communities in
different neighborhoods around Portland so they do not overburden any particular area or host
with a drastic change. This method could certainly work in Seattle and supports John Scholes
hope to expand homeless services throughout various neighborhoods in Seattle instead of
containing them in just a handful of areas, increasing accessibility and keeping one area from
being overcrowded with homeless people. Certain bids from various construction companies,
such as one from TechDwell in Portland, show that the implementation of these homes would be
more affordable than running emergency structures throughout the year. In her article, Brown
states that In 1993, the estimated cost to incarcerate a person for one day was approximately
$40. Based on the HUD data adjusted for inflation, the approximate cost to provide housing,
food, transportation, and counseling services for one day was $30.90 in 1993 (Brown).
Providing the homeless community with permanent structures would also save money by
reducing the amount of hospital visits, especially in the cold winter months.
During the course of the 10-Year Plan, other legislation was put into effect.
Unfortunately, one particularly effective movement was not continued. In the 2012 Annual
Report on the State of Homelessness in Wisconsin the Homeless Prevention and Rapid Rehousing, or HPRP, was discussed. This was a federal program that encouraged local businesses
to not only quickly but permanently house families and individuals already experiencing
homelessness. Between the years of 2009 and 2012, approximately $27 million was taken from
the national fund of $1.5 billion in order to fund homeless service providers. The following table
was taken from Wisconsins annual report to display the amount of people helped by these funds:
Program Sub-Type

Number of Individuals

Number of Households

Served
Served
Homeless Prevention
24,205
10,046
Homeless Assistance
5,502
2,809
Total
29,509
12,735
Follow-up studies indicated that once families were placed in housing, they were significantly
less likely to fall back into homelessness than people who were living in shelters or transitional
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housing. However, the HPRP fund was discontinued after 2012 and these funds are no longer
available.
This literature review displayed the need to identify the gaps in the homeless services
provided in Seattle. With the rising amount of homeless community members displayed in the
2015 One Night Count, the issue of homelessness is obviously not going to solve itself. Both of
the studies done by Martha Burt concerning accessibility and Bonnie Nickasch and Suzanne
Marnocha regarding healthcare displayed the multifaceted issues that hinder the homeless
community from progressing and moving out of homelessness. Physical issues such as
availability, accessibility, and affordability act as major roadblocks when it comes to living
healthily and safely as a homeless person, but there are also many issues concerning the attitude
of the general public toward the homeless community. A lack of community support and an
understanding of the struggles homeless people face on a daily basis can be discouraging for
people who spend their days on the street, repeatedly getting glared at or ignored. While the
physical disapproval of homeless people is apparent, less apparent to the naked eye is the lack of
support for helping these people get off the streets permanently either with transitional housing
or the implementation of the tiny homes idea that has been successful in other parts of the
country. The best way to get these eyesores, as many people call them, off of the street is to
provide them with stable transitional houses, including bathing facilities, to help them get back
on their feet.

Methodology

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The initial step in my project was creating an inventory of the services that Seattle offers
for the homeless population. I created this inventory in winter of 2014 while volunteering at Teen
Feed, which is an organization that is located in the University District that serves homeless
youth in the Seattle area by providing counseling, assistance with gaining accessibility to
services, and nightly meal programs. I worked at Teen Feed for a service learning component of
a geography class I was taking. My main task while working there was to create a resource
binder that clearly listed the homeless services in Seattle that was organized and easy to navigate.
In this binder, I listed the contact information, address, and what their general purpose was as an
organization. I created this binder with the assistance of my mentor, Katelyn Stickel. She
provided me with a lot of guidance regarding the resources that were available as well as how to
search for additional resources she wasnt familiar with. Over the course of ten weeks, the
resource binder ended up being 21 pages full of resources available in Seattle for the homeless
community, ranging from assistance with getting identification to overnight shelters to free
healthcare. When beginning this project in October of 2014, I revisited this inventory I had
created in order to refresh my memory of the services offered. I used this inventory as a baseline
of the services offered and also took advantage of all of the contact information that I collected in
winter of 2014. I used the contact information to distribute surveys, which is explained further in
the third part of my methodology.
Besides collecting an inventory, I also did general research to uncover the current state of
homelessness in Seattle. To do this, I researched relevant issues regarding homeless policy in
Seattle, such as the 10 Year Plan to End Homelessness and why it wasnt successful, the One
Night Count results, causes of increased rates of homelessness, and accounts of homeless
individuals as well as political figures. I used general search engines such as Google in order to
obtain relevant news articles and publications. Given the types of publications I was seeking to
find were primarily news articles published in the last five years, I didnt find it necessary to use
search databases. In order to ensure accuracy and reliability, I did a credibility check by reading
up on the publication if the article was from a newspaper I wasnt familiar with. This research set
a baseline for me to acknowledge what has happened in Seattle over the past decade and allowed
me to hypothesize areas for improvement.

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As I was gauging where Seattle falls in the spectrum of homeless services, it was
important for me to research other cities and their costs and methods regarding homeless
eradication and prevention. The cities I focused on were Portland, Oregon, Salt Lake City, Utah,
and San Francisco, California. All three of these cities implemented the 10 Year Plan to End
Homelessness and saw very different results. Specifically, I chose Portland because it is a city
with a climate that is comparable to Seattles and they are facing similar land availability and
cost of living barriers. I chose San Francisco because like Portland and Seattle, it also
experiences cost of living and land availability issues. Lastly, I chose Salt Lake City because
there was extensive media coverage about how Salt Lake City ended homelessness and I
thought that this would be a positive example that Seattle could learn from. By looking at these
three cities, I was able to pick out both positive and negative aspects of their methodology for
implementing the 10 Year Plan. I began my research by doing a general web search and reading
news articles, and then later looked at online databases through the University of Washingtons
library website for more specific and refutable information.
I recognize that there are many limitations with this method of research. Each city is
different and surrounded by different policies, traditions, weather patterns, cost of living, and
community involvement. There is also a difference of homeless people in relation to the overall
size and population of these cities. In attempting to do a cost analysis and comparison across my
cities of interest, I had to recognize that costs of living in these cities are different. This not only
helps to determine the rate of homelessness, but also the cost of running shelters, providing
alternative forms of housing (i.e. tiny homes), as well as other services such as healthcare,
hygiene, and food banks. Because of these differences, I was unable to get an extremely accurate
cost comparison between my cities of interest. However, for the nature of this project, I felt that a
general estimate of cost differences was sufficient. Cost analysis is a small piece of my project,
and discovering what methods are working in other cities was my main goal in this portion of my
methods.
In addition to research, I also distributed online surveys to 37 homeless service providers
in the Seattle area. I chose to do online surveys in order to reach a broader audience than I would
have reached distributing surveys in person. I chose an online option rather than phone calls
because online is more convenient and allowed for the individuals surveyed to complete the
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surveys when it was convenient for them. For this survey, I used surveymonkey.com. This
website allowed me to generate a survey that was a simple format and easy to answer. The
website also allowed me to easily see my results all together, showing statistics and patterns. See
Appendix 1 for a copy of the survey. My main purpose for the surveys was to gauge where
homeless service providers feel services in Seattle are lacking the most. These individuals work
with the homeless community on a daily basis and therefore their thoughts are justified and come
from their experience. I also asked what demographic their service most commonly helped as
well as what category their services fell into. I obtained emails of the 37 homeless service
providers by searching their websites and finding contact information for one or two staff
members. This portion of my project was completed in winter of 2014 while working at Teen
Feed, which was discussed in part one of my methodology. If specific staff members werent
listed, I emailed the general email address given. This method of contact proved to be
ineffective. From the 37 emails sent, I received feedback from only 4 of the services. Reasons for
this may be because they were getting emails from an unknown person, which is easy to
overlook. Additionally, the survey was sent as a link in the body of the email. Having the survey
not visible in the body of the email also could have been discouraging for the service providers I
reached out too. While this feedback is valuable, it doesnt give me enough results to draw
statistically significant conclusions. This results in information that I can discuss in my report,
but does not make as strong of an argument as I had hoped for.

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Findings and Recommendations

My literature review, case studies, and survey results gave rise to three main themes
regarding homeless policy and reasons why the Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness was not
successful in Seattle. These three themes are cooperation and collaboration, continued support,
and land availability.
The case studies have proven that there needs to be cooperation among city departments
and collaboration between the private and public sectors when it comes to large projects. The
effort to end homelessness needs more than just one departments support; it needs the support of
law enforcement, planners, community members, land owners, business owners, and countless
other groups. One reason Utah was successful in their efforts was from the support from various
groups, a big one being the Mormon Church in providing money and a large amount of people
who supported the movement. The more people who are involved, the more support the
movement will gain and the more successful it will be. Seattle doesnt have as large of a
cohesive group of diverse people backing this movement as it has potential for, and more
cooperation and collaboration between city officials and private organizations will help increase
effectiveness of efforts made to end homelessness as well as increase awareness and gain
community support and involvement. Collaboration between private organizations and public
entities will not only increase the funds available but will also provide more opportunities for
new ideas to present themselves.
While Seattle has had some support in the early phases of implementation of new
movements and efforts, there has not been a strong, well-publicized continuous effort throughout
the whole process. Priorities have been shifted, situations have changed, and the issue of
homelessness has gotten worse with these changes and some people have begun to lose hope.
Instead of providing more long-term support to try to battle the ever-changing and growing issue
of homelessness in Seattle, support has been focused primarily on short-term solutions. As the
case study in Salt Lake City showed, continued support for both the 10 Year Plan and the
homeless community as a whole proved to be a very effective combination. Support for the
homeless community is of vital importance since many homeless people are greatly benefitted by
assistance with getting jobs, finding a safe and affordable place to live, or getting past an
addiction. An organized support system needs to be put in place in conjunction with the physical
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act of getting people off of the streets. Getting homeless people into a safe and affordable
environment is only one part of the task at hand; keeping them there is a whole other aspect that
many people have unfortunately overlooked in past. 100% of the survey respondents felt that
Seattle was lacking the most in transitional services, which are the services that help people
adapt to a change in lifestyles when going from the streets to having a place to call their own.
These services help with finding a job, keeping a job, as well as helps with addiction and mental
health issues. Without adequate transitional services, Seattle will continue to struggle to keep
people from falling back into homelessness.
Land availability is the third trend that was prominent in my research. Gentrification is
occurring in Seattle, resulting in rising rent prices and overall a large increase in cost of living.
There is a huge competition in the housing market and rent prices have steadily increased in
recent years. This has forced people onto the streets, contributing to Seattles current homeless
situation. The rising population has resulted in rising homeless populations, and the housing that
is being built around the city is market-rate, which only a fraction of Seattles residents can
afford. Instead of building affordable housing for the residents who are struggling financially,
developers are designing and building multi-family housing that they can make more money off
of. A main reason for this issue is because of Urban Growth Boundaries put in place by Seattles
Growth Management Act which limits the area in which higher density housing can be built.
With a lack of available land and high demand for housing with Seattles increasing population,
the urban growth boundary is limiting the amount of housing that can be built in general,
especially affordable housing. In order to combat this issue, there needs to be changes in policy
in order to support the large fraction of Seattles population that is in need of rent assistance via
affordable housing. I understand that this is policy change is a project in itself, and I hope that
this report shows the overwhelming need for this change to occur. If Seattle can decrease the
number of homeless people on their streets, a large fraction of the money that is typically
allocated towards shelters and other short term solutions can be allocated towards the
construction of these affordable housing units to serve as an incentive for the developers.

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Conclusion
This project shows the overwhelming need for a change of methods when trying to solve
the problem of homelessness in Seattle. Through looking at case studies and surveying homeless
service providers, I was able to uncover methods that Seattle can adopt in order to help eradicate
homelessness. Seattle currently spends much of its budget on short term solutions for
homelessness such as shelters and emergency services. This is because Seattles homeless
population has been rapidly increasing in recent years and a plan that can handle this consistent
growth has yet to be proposed. This projects aim was to uncover effective methods that Seattle
can implement in order to take a long-term approach to ending homelessness rather than continue
to focus on short-term solutions. While these short-term solutions are valuable and highly
utilized by the homeless population in Seattle, these services are not working towards reducing
the number of homeless people on Seattles streets. In order to start reducing its homeless
population, Seattle needs to focus three main trends Collaboration and cooperation among
departments, continuous support, and land availability. By looking at other citys successes and
failures, Seattle can adopt methods that have proven to be effective in other parts of the country.
This project serves as a starting point with only a small amount of research, using only three case
study cities. There are many other success stories around the world that Seattle can learn and
grow from. If other cities are permanently getting homeless people off their streets, then with the
right methods and implementation, Seattle can too.

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Appendix 1 Online Survey Sent to Homeless Survey Providers

1. Where do you feel services are lacking the most for the homeless community
in Seattle?

Where do you feel services are lacking the most for the homeless community in Seattle? Shelters
Meal Programs
Hygiene facilities
Transitional Services
Job Finding Services
Other (please specify)
2. What age group does your organization most commonly work with?
What age group does your organization most commonly work with? Under 13
13-24
25-35
35-55
55 +
Other (please specify)
3. What type of services does your organization provide?

What type of services does your organization provide?

4. Are you familiar with the "Tiny Homes" movement in other US cities? If yes, do
you think it is beneficial for the homeless community?

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5. Do you have any other comments, questions, or concerns?

Do you have any other comments, questions, or concerns?

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