SPOKANE, Wash. – Residents in Spokane are expressing concerns about the safety of the city’s unhoused population as winter approaches, and after the Trent Resource Assistance Center (TRAC) closed.
Pam Williams and her partner, Doug Overlock, residents of Browne’s Addition, have observed a new encampment on Sunset Highway near their home.
“There were probably a half-dozen people under the overpass right adjacent to that. The police are pretty proactive about keeping the sidewalks clear. Because that’s where they are. And so, the encampment had moved off to the side onto that stretch of grass… And I was just startled to see it,” Williams said.
This encampment appeared shortly after the closure of TRAC on Oct. 31.
The city has shifted to a scattered shelter system, including sites like the Cedar Center operated by Jewels Helping Hands, an organization led by Julie Garcia. Garcia, an advocate for Spokane’s homeless, supports the closure of TRAC but believes it happened too soon.
“I would’ve hoped that we’d figure out a way to keep it open through April, at least through the winter season. This is not just this administration. I’ve been through three. And every October, we’re in the same crisis with people experiencing homelessness being outside. Closing the Trent Shelter wasn’t just losing 250 beds. It was losing 500 beds in the winter time,” Garcia said.
Garcia anticipates that encampments like the one Williams saw will become more common across the city this winter.
“So, what it inevitably does, is it takes the core space, which is the downtown, which, I agree, people experiencing homelessness should not be congregated downtown. But, without having the space for them to go to, then we’ve just dispersed them into neighborhoods. And neighborhoods are unprepared,” Garcia said.
Mayor Lisa Brown explained that the city spent up to $1 million per month to operate TRAC and that the congregate shelter model was not effective.
“Our smaller scattered site model will have better results. Our navigation center is there to bring people in to really make personalized assessments of what they need. And then help transition them to the appropriate housing,” Mayor Brown said.
She also mentioned that those in need could be transitioned to “sobering beds” and treatment facilities.
However, as temperatures drop, Garcia, Williams and Overlock worry that the challenges facing Spokane’s homeless community will intensify.
“I’m concerned for their safety. I’m concerned for the safety of these people when it’s January and it’s 12 below [zero]… And I just don’t know where they’re gonna be,” Overlock said.
The city maintains that the new scattered model offers better care and treatment while saving more than $21 million over the next few years.
