Low Income Housing Institute

No Plan for Drug Treatment and Recovery Options Wednesday evening, Mayor Katie Wilson shared more details about her plan to address the homeless drug crisis destroying the city. As expected, Wilson put an emphasis on how her office was taking the initiative to build more tiny houses and pallet shelters before the FIFA World Cup in June. But Wilson shared virtually ZERO details on drug treatment and recovery options for addicts suffering on the streets. Wilson just said “wrap around services” would be offered to residents at these shelters. In other words, no requirement to use the treatment and recovery options. It’s the same talking point parroted for more than a decade by every King County Democrat that’s presided over Read More ›

A City in Urgency Seattle is moving rapidly to expand shelter for homeless drug addicts before the FIFA World Cup comes to the city. Faster than the public has been given time to fully understand. Mayor Katie Wilson set a goal of adding hundreds of new units in a matter of months. The strategy relies heavily on taxpayer dollars to expand tiny house villages. No one questions the urgency. But speed should not replace accountability and transparency. Lack of Transparency Right now, Seattle is making high-impact decisions about land, funding, and service delivery through a relatively tight network of policymakers, advisors, and providers. And the public has not been given a clear, transparent picture of how those decisions are being made. Read More ›

The Sweeps Continue Aggressive drug encampment sweeps in Seattle are happening on Easter weekend under Mayor Katie Wilson. On Saturday, city crews removed the so called “service resistant” from the corner of 3rd Ave and Blanchard St. But they all came roaring back after cops left the area. The game of Whack-A-Mole is out of control. This is near REACH HQ, the homeless outreach division of Evergreen Treatment Services. This non-profit has received millions of dollars in taxpayer funding from the city to address the street crisis. Yet they can’t even handle the problem right in front of their building. If one of the primary agencies tasked with getting men and women into housing can’t figure this out, how are Read More ›

Exposed We Heart Seattle just exposed fentanyl smoking shacks inside taxpayer funded Low Income Housing Institute’s tiny house villages. But I was chasing this tip as well. Recently, I point-blank asked LIHI Executive Director Sharon Lee about these controversial “safe consumption” sites on her properties. Instead of giving me a yes or no answer, listen to what she had to say.

Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson bragged about delaying an encampment sweep so she could place several homeless people into shelter and housing, implying this would be a new way of getting people off the streets. “There I talked with a woman who was five months sober,” Mayor Wilson said at her State of the City Address, “and had three small dogs. We were able to identify a spot for her in a tiny house village.” But after Wilson’s State of the City Address last week, We Heart Seattle’s Andrea Suarez did a simple follow-up to see if that woman with three dogs actually made it off the streets. “People don’t always accept the services they’re referred to,” Suarez explained. Surrounded by Read More ›

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 ›