Homelessness

Breaking An absolutely devastating blow to King County Executive Dow Constantine and Sheriff Patti-Cole Tindall. A judge tossed their lawsuit against the city of Burien that questioned the constitutionality of the city’s public camping ordinance. Right after today’s decision, Mayor Kevin Schilling spoke to me about the implications. Burien’s Suit Against King County Remains Now that King County has been ordered to enforce the camping ban, it’s still unclear when officers will start sweeping encampments. Making matters worse for King County, Burien is still suing for breach of contract and that’s winding its way through the courts. STATEMENT FROM CITY: Legal Challenge to Ordinance 832 Dismissed – City of Burien (burienwa.gov) Constantine’s Policies Must Be Scrutinized After this massive loss, Read More ›

A Tour Through Downtown Spokane’s leaders are denying it’s out of control. Left-wing corporate media members in this city are too compromised or weak to show the truth. That’s why Pete Serrano and I visited some of the worst parts of downtown this past weekend to see for ourselves. This is not just an affordable housing crisis. This chaos is being fueled by drug addiction, mental illness, and broken relationships. The only ones benefitting are people working in the homeless industrial complex who want more taxpayer dollars to maintain their grift. The current plan is not working. Fentanyl Addiction Making matters worse, Tranq fentanyl is all over the streets of Spokane. Housing First Does Not Work Then you have out-of-touch Read More ›

“Housing First” remains a massive policy failure. Homeless in Spokane are being given free taxpayer subsidized housing, but zero requirements to go into addiction treatment or job training. So they end up back on the streets to get high because they have nothing better to do all day. Rinse and repeat. Listen to this guy describe the scene outside Catholic Charities buildings. Drug dealers are preying on addicts at all hours of the day. When will local politicians address this madness? Spokane is now officially the Seattle of Eastern Washington. Pete Serrano is on a listening tour so he can work with addicts to break this cycle.

I was critical of sociologist Matthew Desmond in my last two columns, but I do appreciate that he based his research in Milwaukee. The Midwest is often overlooked in discussions about homelessness. Journalists more often write about California, home to about half of all unsheltered homeless people in the U.S., and New York, flush with immigrants. “Housing First” became a familiar slogan partly because of journalistic near-sightedness: High housing prices in some coastal cities make it easy for coast-based reporters to argue that finances are central to the homelessness problem — but the middle of the country looks very different. Fact: 60 U.S. cities with more than 100,000 residents — many in the north central sector stretching from Buffalo to Read More ›

Look at this lost soul in Burien. She’s sitting in a pile of trash next to Camp Constantine and the King County Sheriff’s Office. I tried to connect her with homeless outreach groups like The More We Love. But she told me this is what she wanted and rejected an opportunity to get off the streets. At what point do we say enough is enough and just intervene?

The Sweep is On Accompanied by police, crews moved in Thursday morning and dismantled the drug encampment next to the Starbucks in Burien. Numerous campers rejected shelter or services. Some tried to move into “Camp Constantine” down the street, but that one is currently full. I also noticed several homeless men and women who have been on the streets since last year. Again, they are rejecting the help because they are caught up in the unending cycle of drugs and mental illness. It’s time for an intervention and accountability.

Happening Now Crews are getting ready to sweep the Starbucks drug encampment today on SW 148th St in Burien. Dozens of tents and structures are blocking a city right of way so it’s considered a fire hazard. Outreach teams have been here daily, trying to get people into treatment and shelter. This is just minutes from “Camp Constantine,” another drug and crime infested encampment being allowed to flourish under King County Executive Dow Constantine. Some of the campers being cleared out told me they are planning to make a lateral move. The game of whack a mole continues in Burien. Children Spotted in Encampment The Starbucks camp has been up for most of the summer. Aside from being a revolving Read More ›

Breaking Authorities say a man plowed his car into Dow Constantine’s drug encampment in Burien Saturday morning because he was unhappy it was still up. Campers apparently bear maced the driver and cops came by and arrested him at the scene. This is just the latest problematic incident associated with this camp. Pictures Photos now coming in from eye witnesses who saw the massive police response to Dow Constantine’s drug encampment in Burien Saturday morning after a driver plowed through the fenced off area.

I summarized last week reviews of Matthew Desmond’s Evicted, a book published in 2016 that uses Dickens-like characters and won a Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction. Two months ago, the New York Times even put Evicted in 21st place on its list of 100 books of the 21st century. A Chronicle of Higher Education writer called Desmond “sociology’s next great hope.” One problem, though, is that Evicted offers almost no hope. Based on my experience, I’d say that those who talk about personal causes of poverty and those who talk about structural/societal causes are both right: People are poor for both reasons, and the proportion varies from individual to individual, but I’ve never seen it 100% one way or the other Read More ›

Last week I reviewed academic research regarding homelessness and foster care from this century’s first decade. Scholars debated the circumstances within which people develop executive function: planning ahead and giving up immediate rewards for long-term benefits. How do people on long losing streaks avoid “learning helplessness,” the fatalistic sense that, regardless of what we do right, everything goes wrong? The consensus developed during the second decade is that ACEs (“adverse childhood experiences”) go wild: ACEs such as suffering abuse or neglect, witnessing violence in the home or community, or having a family member attempt or die by suicide, undermine senses of safety and stability. Substance use and mental health problems also deal ACEs. Many U.S. adults experience at least one Read More ›