(The Center Square) – Transitioning out of its current role managing Mayor Lisa Brown’s scattered-site shelter model, Waters Meet Foundation is now preparing to prop up a controversial tiny home village.
The Spokesman-Review first reported in July that the nonprofit, once called Empire Health Foundation, planned to install several pallet-style homes for homeless individuals in Spokane. The project wouldn’t be the first of its kind, but what current sits next door is a concern.
WMF intends to install the New Roots Village in Spokane’s West Hills neighborhood, on the same plot as AscendA, a sober-living facility that has operated there for more than two decades. The nonprofit purchased the property with plans to potentially expand AscendA later on, which has since changed.
“We are going to play a landowner, site development and community advisory liaison role,” Program Director Barbra Bowman told the Spokane City Council on Monday. “Pulling together the community advisory committee role alongside the operator, once selected, and that currently is in process.”
WMF’s time operating Brown’s scattered-site model will come to a close at the end of the month. The mayor proposed the idea shortly after taking office as a more humane approach to homelessness. As part of the work, the nonprofit was largely responsible for managing the Housing Navigation Center.
The navigation center acts as a funnel for the rest of the system, referring individuals to shelters with about 30 beds each or other housing and support services. WMF played a role in those referrals and contracted other providers to run the shelters and respite centers, holding much of the purse strings.
Bowman said the navigation center will transition to a day-service model next month as the providers transition people living there to other shelters. Those providers will contract directly with the city from now on, as WMF prioritizes its next venture after already having spent $575,000 in state funding on it.
According to WMF’s website, the city will select an operator for the New Roots Village from an Aug. 20 request for proposals. WMF claims “the plan is not for this to be a low-barrier, emergency shelter,” meaning residents could be held to specific standards, which may include varying levels of sobriety.
However, whether the project is low-barrier or not will ultimately be up to the city and the operator.
“Low barrier, permanent housing-focused shelters not only ensure individuals and families have a safe place to stay, but that their experience of homelessness is as brief as possible,” according to the city’s website. “Shelters should ensure that they have no barriers to entry and have inclusive policies for all.”
Some residents at the neighboring sober-living facility worry that the new project will attract open-air drug use after spending years battling addiction. Some have lived at AscendA for years and attribute their sobriety to the surrounding environment, which could change if a low-barrier facility is next door.
The Center Square contacted AscendA for comment but did not receive a response before publishing.
WMF hopes to have the New Roots Village up and running by the end of October or early November.
While the nonprofit held a community meeting in late July, Bowman said that WMF will keep meeting with neighbors weekly, including with AscendA, as the village will occupy part of that area of the property, too.
“We’ve heard concerns about sex offenders, we’ve heard concerns about kind of where people are on their sobriety path and how that relates to other neighbors. We’re providing that information to [city] staff,” WMF President Zeke Smith responded when asked about monitoring who will live there.
