Housing First

Last weekend, former President Barack Obama acknowledged a blunt political reality: “The average person doesn’t want to have to navigate around a tent city in the middle of downtown … and we’re not going to be able to generate support [for treatment] if we simply say, ‘It’s not their fault, they should be able to do whatever they want,’ because that’s a losing political strategy.”

What makes the remark notable is not merely its candor. It is the history behind it.

It was the Obama administration that institutionalized the federal government’s one-size-fits-all embrace of Housing First in 2013. They promised the approach would end homelessness within a decade by prioritizing immediate housing placement.

The theory was simple: Housing would stabilize lives.

But the results have been anything but stabilizing.

Making the Problem Worse The homeless drug crisis is out of control in Seattle. And it’s now evident Mayor Katie Wilson is going to make the problem worse. During her first State of the City address, she talked about building more housing and shelter. But no solutions to deal with mental illness or drug addiction ravaging the city. Sweep, Sweep, Sweep Aside from changing some policy language, she is pretty much doing the same thing as the last mayor of Seattle. Sweep, sweep, sweep. And the game of Whack-A-Mole continues. Same Old Same Old Wilson’s spokesperson recently told the Seattle Times that, “the mayor isn’t pursuing a significant shift in encampment clearing strategies from the previous administration.” Ignoring the Service Read More ›

Repeating Mistakes During Tuesday’s State of the City address, Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson will say she is building more affordable housing to address the city’s homeless crisis. But she’s doubling down on the same “Housing First” policies that have failed this region for more than a decade and it won’t work. Not until she figures out how to deal with the “service resistant” class of people living on the streets. These are the men and women who are heavily addicted to drugs and refuse all shelter and treatment services currently available. Just drive down Rainier Ave S and you will find them everywhere. All the encampment sweeps under her watch have forced many people to move to this part of Read More ›

In a recent ruling that defies both logic and compassion, a federal judge has blocked the Trump administration’s effort to reform the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) Continuum of Care program — the federal government’s primary funding mechanism for homelessness assistance.

The lawsuit — filed by a coalition of 20 mostly Democratic-led states, local governments, and nonprofit organizations and spearheaded by groups such as Democracy Forward — warns of “funding gaps,” winter instability, and the potential displacement of people currently housed. These alarms are sounded even though HUD includes a nearly 12% increase over last year’s funding allocation.

At the core of the complaint is a revealing claim: that reform would “upend longstanding projects that have been thoughtfully developed to comport with evidence-based, best-practices services delivery.”

But HUD’s own data make clear that the evidence on which they have long relied is catastrophically wrong.

I’ve spent years working directly with Seattle’s homeless population, not studying them from university offices, or analyzing data sets from a comfortable distance, but on the streets, in the encampments, doing street-level engagement and intervention. When I read yet another opinion piece (“Homelessness in Seattle: We can’t unsee it.” Dec. 28, 2025) attributing our homelessness crisis primarily to housing costs, I have to ask: Are we really going to continue trusting consultants and researchers over what our own eyes tell us?

The December piece by Walter Hatch follows a familiar pattern in academia: Start with a conclusion, in this case, that “it’s a housing problem,” then find data to support it. However, those of us working on the ground are aware of a critical fact that these analyses consistently overlook: There’s a fundamental distinction between the “crisis population” living in visible squalor on our streets and individuals who are the working poor — couch-surfing, living with family or struggling with roommates to afford rent.

We cannot conflate these populations. They are not the same.

Marsha Michaelis appeared on The Earthvox Podcast with Ryan Keogan. After discussing Michaelis’ journey from the Evergreen Freedom Foundation to homeschooling to her current position at Discovery Institute’s Fix Homelessness initiative, they then discuss her recent article exploring the kinds of solutions society could offer a family in acute distress, homelessness, and drug addiction. The conversation continues with problems with the Housing First approach to homelessness, how the Trump administration is addressing homelessness, the nature of compassion, and more.

A book written and applauded by experts can tempt you to doubt your common sense and quietly surrender intellectual ground at a crucial moment, especially if it makes a bold claim and you haven’t read it yet. Consider Homelessness is a Housing Problem by authors Gregg Colburn (an assistant professor at the University of Washington) and Clayton Page Aldern (a Seattle-based data scientist and policy analyst). The book’s attractive cover claims the authors have used “accessible statistical analysis” to “test a range of conventional beliefs about what drives the prevalence of homelessness in a given city—including mental illness, drug use, poverty, weather, generosity of public assistance, and low-income mobility—and find that none explain the variation observed across the country.” (A Read More ›

On December 16, HUD Secretary Scott Turner toured facilities at the Helping Up Mission in Baltimore, Maryland, a faith-based organization serving the homeless for 140 years. This visit was part of a larger tour in which Turner will visit facilities that are successfully helping people transition from homelessness to self-sustained living as HUD reexamines its approach to homelessness. WMAR 2 News reports: U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner toured Helping Up Mission’s men’s recovery campus today, meeting with clients and staff to learn how healthcare, recovery, job training and faith work together to address homelessness. Turner said models like this are key to helping people move toward independence rather than long-term dependence. For nearly 140 years, Helping Up Read More ›

Tackling the Root Causes HUD Secretary Scott Turner takes direct aim at America’s “homeless industrial complex” and says the the days of “warehousing people” are over. The Trump administration is reallocating federal dollars to tackle the root causes of homelessness like drug addiction and mental illness. This plan could cripple so called Housing First programs that do not require people to find jobs or enter drug treatment. Many of these understaffed facilities under Housing First also trigger the most 911 calls in cities, allow drug use behind closed doors, and attract an inordinate amount of crime to neighborhoods. California and WA are ranked in the top three for overall homelessness in the nation. But elected officials in these states are Read More ›

Of all the things a citizen should reasonably expect from her city, the “quiet enjoyment and protection of her civil rights and liberties” (so phrased by the great English jurist William Blackstone) is certainly foremost. Linda Biel, a citizen and business owner in the city of Spokane, is being denied that. Like most citizens of Spokane, when Linda pursues her dreams life in the city gets better. She pays taxes, creates jobs, provides desirable services, improves and expands her business in response to the community, and engages helpfully with her neighbors. Linda’s dream is good: She loves beauty and wellness, and long-imagined building and operating her own sophisticated downtown spa. She worked hard over many years, studying business and mathematics Read More ›