Civic coalition wants to make Seattle’s homeless response part of the City Charter

On April 1, 2021 Tim Burgess, former City Council Member and Interim Mayor, announced an initiative to establish housing and social services to help chronically homeless individuals move off Seattle streets and parks and into shelter or housing with supportive services.

The plan, from Compassion Seattle a coalition of service providers and civic and business leaders, comes just as Seattle’s homeless crisis enters its sixth year. The problem and proposed solutions are not new.  So what’s different from current and previous homelessness efforts?

It’s the method. Compassion Seattle has filed a citizen’s initiative on the November ballot to add an amendment to the City Charter.  It would assign government responsibility, accountability and acceptable actions for resolving this ongoing humanitarian crisis.

In addition to business groups, the measure is supported by a who’s who of social service providers including Evergreen Treatment Services, Chief Seattle Club, the Public Defender Association, Plymouth Housing, FareStart, the Downtown Emergency Service Center and United Way among others.

The measure needs 33,000 signatures to make the ballot and petition will be available soon.  Click here to learn more about Compassion Seattle and read on as Coalition member and former Council Member Tim Burgess explains.

Later today, an alliance of civic, business and neighborhood leaders will file a citizen initiative with Seattle’s City Clerk to require city government to take specific steps to end chronic homelessness and address the proliferation of tent encampments across Seattle. The initiative also has support from social service and housing providers.

I’ve been involved with this group from the beginning and it’s very gratifying to see people come together to solve a huge problem that threatens to derail our post-pandemic economic recovery. Local job creators — both large and small businesses — need their customers and clients to be confident they can safely and comfortably return to downtown and neighborhood business districts. Today’s citizen initiative creates a compassionate, reasonable, accountable path toward that end.

Use these links to read our media release, polling results, a frequently asked questions document, and the Charter amendment text.

There’s no quick fix to homelessness in Seattle. It will take a focused, determined and consistent effort, especially with individuals enduring chronic homelessness — people who have been homeless for more than a year or three or more times in the past four years and who also have a mental health, substance abuse or physical disability challenge. As you can imagine, many barriers block this population from receiving help and staying engaged with rehab and recovery services.

That’s why the ultimate solution is a combination of behavioral health services and emergency or permanent housing; the two go hand-in-hand because living in a tent in a park or on a sidewalk is not a good environment for effective care.

Our group — Compassion Seattle — will advance this citizen initiative as a City of Seattle Charter amendment. In early April we will begin collecting the required 32,060 signatures to qualify the measure for the November ballot. Social service leaders supporting adoption of this ballot measure include the executive directors of the Evergreen Treatment Services, Chief Seattle Club, Public Defender Association, Plymouth Housing, FareStart, Downtown Emergency Service Center, United Way, and others.

If Seattle voters approve the Charter amendment in November city government will be required to:

1. “work to end chronic homelessness and racial disparities in the homeless population,” with the goal that “no one should have to live outdoors in public spaces.”

2. offer behavioral health programs and services in combination with access to housing “in enhanced shelters, tiny houses, hotel-motel rooms, other forms of non-congregate emergency or permanent housing.”

3. provide, within six months of the effective date of the Charter amendment, an additional 1,000 units of emergency and permanent housing and another 1,000 units within one year of the adoption of the amendment, a total of 2,000 units within 12 months.

4. ensure that “City parks, playgrounds, sports fields, public spaces and sidewalks and streets remain open and clear of encampments” once the amendment-stipulated programs and services are available.

5. fund the “deployment of a behavioral health rapid-response field capability” as a non-law enforcement crisis response option.

6. contract with King County to “help fund low-barrier, rapid-access mental health and substance use disorder treatment and services” with a focus on those who are chronically homeless and face the greatest barriers to these services.

7. establish a Human Services Fund to support programs and services offered by the City and to place in this Fund “not less than 12 percent of the City’s annual general fund revenues, any grants, gifts and bequests for human service purposes received from the general public, businesses and philanthropy, and any other such moneys as may be provided by ordinance.”

8. “identify and address factors known to drive the overrepresentation of Black, Indigenous and People of Color among those experiencing chronic homelessness” through culturally competent services.

9. accelerate the production of emergency and permanent housing, to the extent permitted by state law during a declared civil emergency related to homelessness, by waiving land use code requirements and City project-related permitting fees, processing all project-related permit applications as “first-in-line,” and refunding the City’s portion of the sales tax related to the construction or remodeling of emergency and permanent housing.

10. fully support, advance and invest in the regional governmental homelessness authority.

This ballot measure creates a plan to provide meaningful help to people living outdoors while also making sure our parks, playgrounds, sports fields, sidewalks and streets are cleared of encampments.

Petitions for signatures will be available in early April. I hope you will join me in collecting signatures to qualify this measure for the November ballot. Stayed tuned for particulars.

Compassion Seattle is leading this campaign. Visit their website at www.CompassionSeattle.org.