‘Housing First’ in Washington: A Decade of Failure and Tragedy

ChangeWA marks the 10-year anniversary of the City of Seattle and King County declaring homelessness an emergency with the first of a two-part series. This week we will examine the devastating results of the region’s homelessness strategy. Next week in part two, we will provide commonsense solutions that have reversed the negative trends in other communities.

On November 2, 2015, King County Executive Dow Constantine and Seattle Mayor Ed Murray stood before the local media to declare an emergency over the region’s homelessness crisis. The two career politicians called for all levels of government, the business community, and non-profits to join their efforts to stop the increasing number of encampments that were appearing in public spaces, mostly in Seattle.

Executive Constantine and Mayor Murray, along with the dozen like-minded politicians standing behind them, pledged full support to a regional four-year plan named “All Home” that they said would eliminate homelessness by the end of the decade. Like all “Housing First” style homelessness policies, it depended on a massive “public investment” in housing projects and increasing the number of services available to those living on the streets, under bridges and in the parks.

All levels of government passed new taxes for more social services and created the King County Regional Homelessness Authority (KCRHA) bureaucracy. The region’s progressive leaders were out to show that a bigger government could solve a serious issue. They promised that the 10,047 who were then homeless would soon be living in public housing while receiving the medical and mental help they needed. Well-funded government programs would eliminate struggling individuals’ misfortunes, and shortly they would be active and productive members of our community.

This weekend marks the 10-year anniversary of the emergency proclamation and thus it seems appropriate to review how the Democrats’ bigger government policies have done in meeting their stated goals.

Simply stated, for nearly everyone (especially those suffering on the streets) the region’s homelessness response has been a colossal failure. Yet it has been a success for a small group of Democrat party bosses and politicians, a few unscrupulous non-profit leaders, and thousands of government bureaucrats, for it has provided them with a financial windfall.

Here are a few important facts about the current homelessness strategy:

• Homelessness in King County has risen 68%, from 10.047 in 2015 to 16,858. The homeless population has grown every year since the emergency declaration.
• Seattle/King County has become a magnet for attracting America’s homeless. A recent Discovery Institute survey found that only 19.8% of those experiencing homelessness in King County attended high school here. They are attracted to the region due to the 5,000 services provided to them and the lax laws regarding drug use and encampments
• Led by King County, Washington State has the highest number of “chronically homeless” people in the country.
• Both King County’s “All Home” project and the KCRHA’s “Partnership for Zero” (to eliminate homelessness downtown) were expensive failed projects that wasted resources and failed to remove homeless individuals from the street.
• The number of annual homeless deaths have risen more than 500% from approximately 75 in 2015 to 421 in 2023.
• Homelessness and drug addiction often go hand in hand. Since 2020, more than 5,000 people have died of drug overdoses In King County – many in public housing where “low-barrier” requirements allow residents to use illegal drugs.
• The King County Regional Homelessness Authority (KCRHA) was created in 2019 and has been embroiled in numerous controversies and is responsible for many policy failures. Its first CEO (Marc Dones) was fired and KCRHA’s dysfunctional reputation is so severe that after a nationwide search, only one-person (a career bureaucrat) was willing to interview for the CEO position.
• In 2015, King County said that it spent $36 million on the homeless issue. In late 2024 County Executive Constantine refused to even estimate how much he annually authorized to be spent on the issue.
• King County’s Housing for Health program spent nearly half a billion dollars to buy and refurbish approximately 1,600 hotel units (in 15 former hotels across the county) to warehouse homeless individuals. A majority of the residents in these “low barrier” facilities suffer from active drug addiction or untreated mental illness.
• Poor management and lack of accountability have resulted in an environment where:
  • An audit revealed that massive fraud has likely taken place with the distribution of $1.8 billion in annual grants from the King County Department of Community and Human Services.
  • A Discovery Institute study found that KCRHA paid 17 organizations more than a million dollars to provide emergency housing. Only five submitted reports about what they did with the money.
  • A new report from Capital Research Group details how violent extremist groups (like Antifa) have infiltrated local homeless organizations and have become recipients of taxpayer money that is meant to help those who are homeless.
  • Brandi Kruse revealed that some non-profits were denying housing funds to legitimate low income or minority recipients. Instead, the funds are given to friends and relatives.

All truly compassionate homeless advocates should be angry with the decade of disappointing results. King County and Seattle’s Emergency Proclamation has increased the suffering.  More homeless, more death, more suffering. Higher costs.

Unfortunately, there are no public figures for what is being spent on homelessness in King County.  In 2017, the Puget Sound Business Journal estimated that it was more than a billion dollars a year. We know that since then, all levels of government (federal, state, county, and city) have significantly increased their homeless expenditures.

Is this really the best Seattle/King County can do?  The government is handing $300,000+ rooms with no strings attached and spending tens of thousands of dollars on free services for each resident. Yet, the best we can do is warehouse them while they deteriorate with fentanyl or some other deadly drug?  Those who don’t die become dependent on government to obtain free services paid for by the taxpayers.

We can do better.  There is plenty of money – we are just spending it on very bad policies.

Next week in part two, we will discuss solutions that work, are far less expensive, and have the aim of leading people towards self-sufficiency. Stay informed. The debate on homelessness is changing, and many good things could soon happen.