Comments

1
that is a link to "ugly" opposition? it can get a LOT uglier than that.
2
This is so great. Finally the city found a solution to spend many, many more millions of tax payer dollars on! Tents?! Who knew the answer was tents?!....in neighborhoods?! It's been working so great for the past 11 years....lets just set up more! It would just be way too cruel to politely ask these down or their luck folks to leave their neighborhoods they chose and move to a giant parking lot or building in SODO say and create their own community with massive central services in one place, and 24/7 care and hope rather than this scattered shit show all over the streets of Seattle BS.

A newcomer to Seattle that thinks this is so kind and humane defends this policy and then is given the quick history lesson and has questions. "Wait....a lot of these folks have MOVED her recently? (lift the thinking cap slightly to begin scratching head) There is no record of these band-aid solutions working in over a decade? Why? Why would a homeless person move to Seattle?.....We've put SO much money into this issue. You mean the more we spend the greater the issue becomes? Hmmm..."

Then overhears a poor fella talking to another new guy in town in Ballard while waiting for the bus. "You mean they don't care who you are? They feed you? Give you laundry and showers and free everything? And I don't have to work at all even for it?! I gotta get a few other of my friends out here! Hellz yeah! Dude....They don't even bother you for breaking the law?! "Hey, you only got 2 bikes?!....let me show you this cache under that tarp over there. I got 5 ....just last night bro!" Hang with me I'll show you the ropes. You do meth, crack or heroin? The White long RV with the red stripe over off Leary takes bike parts for fixes...even from kids bikes?! He's always open too and the cops don't care or even bug him. QFC also doesn't care if you take carts for your pad or shoplift so we gotta get you hooked up there too. The best part I forgot to tell you is that the cops have been ordered from the city and ARE NOT ALLOWED to bother or bust us! With his new found hope the new guy yells,Saweeeet! Let's Party! "Who's streets?!"....The veteran laughs wildly and coughs and says, "Damn straight brotha!" (High Five!)

The crime in Ballard has went through the roof in the last few years. Criminal zombies are the norm everywhere now and the closest police station is at Northgate Mall 5 miles away and a 15 minute drive.

I was at the local party store (Iman's) recently and when asked about the new tent camp and the increase in homeless recently, the owner let me know he's all set and has not only moved his terrific selection of high alcohol bum cans to the front coolers, he has also raised the prices he informed me with a smile. The 7-11 at 32nd has cleared an area on the back shelves and now carries a fine selection of low priced, super high alcohol jars of "moonshine". Gee....wonder why. Must be those Sunset Hill peeps getting all Cra again.

What an embarrassing city hall......
3
@2 Makes the wrong assumption that all homeless are criminals and gave up housing voluntarily. What an embarrassingly awful person.
4
Do you live near an encampment?

I didn't think so.
5
@3 Not criminal, but many have substance abuse issues. They used to be called "drunks" but that's not PC.
6
How is Ballard not a residential area? I can throw a baseball from the camp and have it land on someone's doorstep. Or maybe the fact that this is a block from the Ballard locks and cross the street and next to restaurants. Great idea a homeless camp next to a tourist attraction. Weeeeeeee it is fun being stupid.

What is sad is knowing that this is a dumb idea, but knowing that the city doesn't have any ideas better than this.
7
@3 naively assumes @2 is saying "all". Why?
@3 believes the truth being relayed means @2 is an awful person.

@2 lives the the middle of that scene in Ballard and sees the mess he speaks of daily.
@2 has also been a victim more than twice to these people on the streets with zero care from police.
@2 volunteers at a transitional camp and has had it with our city.....
9
@8
+1

Yep. The same preachy hipsters do nothing but bash on Tukwila and Everett somehow think attracting toothless meth thieves is their way of sticking it "Nimby's" and fascists" who would prefer not to walk thru human feces and dirty needles.

This really isn't surprising. Look at Yakima: it's a major crime hub because it became "racist" to try to stem the flow of illegal immigrants. Now it's a crime ridden hell hole drug distribution hub, which the hipsters laugh at privately, but they'll wave the rainbow diversity flag any chance they get because it might inconvenience some "evil conservatives" at some point.

They can't acknowledge that a large percentage of the homeless are derelict scumbag criminals.
10
Local opposition is entirely reasonable, given that the Ballard site is literally in the backyard of multiple townhomes and apartments and the city refuses to provide any data that the encampment won’t impact local business.


11
@2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. I rest my case.

@8: I don't loathe our rustics or their hobbies. I loathe, in general, their blinkered politics and irrational fears. And yours.
12
@10: how could they provide data that doesn't exist yet?
13
The sad thing is that two years from now when this camp has moved on and nothing bad has happened, these same assholes will have learned nothing. Remember how wrong they were about the minimum wage? Same thing. They're zombies.
14
Why is it still called Nickelsville. Greg Nickels hasn't been mayor for years. Why not Murraytown?
15
@14

The nimbys do call it Murraysville. I guess you missed the speeches at those huge Catherine Weatbrook rallies that rocked the city in the months leading up to her crushing victory over Mike O'Brien.
16
@12 What doesn’t data exist, these encampments have existed for years or have they never been located between homes and businesses?
17
@11
Sorry, Dude, I've been hassled by these guy - one of them wielding a bat so I threatened to pepper spray him - had my stuff stolen *twice* in the Leary/Frelard "Tweakertown".

I'm not typing this from an office in Bellevue. I'm a long time "street level" Seattle resident.
18
@17 bullshit.
19
@17

So your plan is keep them sleeping in doorways and under bridges and you'll be safe?
20
Liberal Logic:

Build trails, bike lanes, and alternative transit so people drive less.
Makes bus stops, trails, and sidewalks unsafe after dark by letting cretins roam free.
21
@19
I'd be willing to bet I've spent more time working among the homeless in various jobs than you.
Try harder. The heroin epidemic and our permissive attitude towards the real "bums" has turned some nice areas into dumping grounds.
22
@18
Take a walk in Frelard after dark, hippie.
23
@13

Nice try. I share the same view as many of my neighbors. This camp is the least of our Ballard concerns. Zero police is #1. Turning a blind eye to open air crime and shooting up is #2. The existing crew already living here is #3.

There are, and have been rapidly increasing, PLENTY of "camps" and nearly 200 RV's that line the neighborhood already trashing the streets, parks, and robbing everything they can to get high or drunk while dumping raw sewage and moving a block here and there.

These campers will be saints when compared. The camp at least will have a babysitter with a cell phone to call 911. Do police show up for incidents near a city sanctioned homeless camp? Three of my neighbors have had there homes doors literally kicked in and robbed and the cops showed up 6 hours later.....after calling to see if they still wanted them to come after 4 hours...

24
@16: THIS one hasn't. Don't you have Dori Monson to listen to right now?
25
@21

What the fuck does "working among the homeless" mean? You shopping cart retriever when you're not bagging?

If you hate the "permissive" attitude so much, why are you here? Have you not noticed how unpopular your ideas are, and how they grow even more unpopular with each passing year? All the stuff you hate about Seattle is only going to get worse in your eyes. What are you even doing here?
26
OK, NIMBYs, where do they go? what does the city do? 22% more homeless sleeping on the street in the last year.

one way plane tickets to Honolulu? bus tickets to Las Vegas? build 3000 units of subsidized housing in the next year?

tell me how you solve the problem - it seems intractable to me.
28
@27: so, like a debtor's prison. good idea. we don't nearly have enough people in jail in this country.

its easy to analyze (here's what you stupid hippies are doing wrong), it's hard to synthesize (here's a realistic LEGAL option).
29
Go ahead and rip all you want if it makes you feel better and productive. These are just ideas as you asked...not saying any are answers or even possible.

- Purchase land or a building that is large enough to house say half of the existing homeless population. Or maybe even the existing city sanctioned camps folks. Seattle is large It doesn't have to be downtown at all surrounded by temptations.
- Create incredible medical and mental heath services on site with full time help.
- Delicious meals and community events and movie nights and social gatherings.
- Create an incentive system in which you get greater benefits or accommodations when showing that you have high interest in sobriety and getting off the streets. Assign these same people as internal councilors to work with others so that they are more trustworthy as they were in the same boat recently in previous years to show there is hope.
- Putting those that stay here to work in the camp for starters and create an environment where each held accountable of helping one another while creating a community feeling by working together at the camp.
- Work options off site for the city collecting garbage for a paycheck instead of SDOT.
- $50 MILLION dollars a year already being spent can be put into the hands of someone that is a leading expert on mental health and homelessness for a one of a kind trial at a new solution over what is currently going on in this city.
- Actually know who is in your camp and their criminal history to eliminate those wanted in other states that move here to hide.
- Begin to actually create a data log in which statistical data will assist and modify the approach as needed to create a better life for those in need of help that want it.

Outside of this grand camp. Go after the pushers that keep these folks totally strung out with easy access to drugs to further the demons. POLICE the laws that are in place that every single tax paying citizen who works day in and out to help support these homeless camps must live by to create safer streets for EVERYONE homeless or not.

I hope ideas are appreciated. Please add or share others as something has to change around here now.

30
@29

Conservatism, in other words. That's going to sell.
31
Too bad that people commenting here can't seem to get beyond their binary reactions.

The fact is as someone who has lived in Ballard for year, it is unarguable that some of our new homeless residents are committing crimes, dealing drugs, running prostitution and, yes, threatening people. Don't believe us? Just come on down and visit. Walk into any of the blue-collar manufacturers in the area and ask if they have had any problems. Look at the crime stats for central Ballard. Ask the real people who have been threatened with knives, screw drivers, had their cars and business doors intentionally urinated on because they asked someone to move so they could open their story. And in one case, pistol whipped. Or maybe the saw the two teenagers doing the heroin nod a half-block from the RV dealing drugs. If you are a woman like me, then you'll understand why sometime you don't feel safe when you are walking along past areas of unauthorized encampments.

Expressing that reality doesn't mean that someone is against better approaches to helping people out of homelessness. Most people in Ballard would fully support housing first, additional temporary shelters, addiction services, mental health services, outreach workers, etc. But the holier-than-thou crowd, perfectly exemplified here, are so knee-jerk in their response as to be, well, comical. You say "what's your idea for dealing with this" as if you are offering any real solution. Most of you, I'd guess, have no clue about the long history of the city's failed approaches to homelessness. And then, instead of supporting the difficult, but necessary, changes to our approach so that the now nearly $50 million we will spend on homelessness produces measurable and improved outcomes for those on the streets, you'll just mindlessly support the same tired activists pushing for the same failed "solutions."

The Stranger's coverage of this issue is one-dimension and a total joke. You can't wrap your heads around the fact that a lot of residents and businesses in Ballard worked for months to find a larger location for the camp that would have better served the needs of campers and wasn't right on the neighborhood's main street. Usually, that kind of good faith effort to find balance and solutions should be heralded. But here, it's treated as just routine NIMBYism. Instead of building allies in this effort, The Stranger just demands dogma.

Most people in this city are on the same page -- we want to help people in need so we can dramatically reduce the number of people living on our streets. That's definitely true in Ballard.

But call people a NIMBY and dismissing their experiences just because it doesn't fit a social justice narrative is counterproductive. We could be building a bigger coalition of people to support real solutions to this crisis. But you'd all just rather yell at over each other than stopping to listen and acknowledge the variety of perspectives on this issue.
32
@29: thanks - I think you might find that several of your ideas are being implemented in some form in the tent cities. 50 million a year isn't going to happen though.

a 1500-unit building is phenomenally large. it's an apartment complex. a typical 5/1 affordable housing project has around a 100 units.

I've often thought of recreating the "flop houses" that were normal housing for the poor prior to WW2 to deal with this crisis. it would be tough to do in a warehouse building given fire codes. maybe there is such a place in SODO, however.
33
For the long term, these camps are a bad idea. We'll run out of land for them, animosities will continue to exacerbate. No, I'd rather have money diverted from the mayor's 'Let's Move' property tax racketeering slush fund to social outreach, more detox beds, subsidies for non-profits that are helping the homeless, etc.
34
Reposting after fixing a few typos.

Too bad that people commenting here can't seem to get beyond their binary reactions.

The fact is as someone who has lived in Ballard for years, it is unarguable that some of our new homeless residents are committing crimes, dealing drugs, running prostitution and, yes, threatening people. Don't believe us? Just come on down and visit. Walk into any of the blue-collar manufacturers in the area and ask if they have had any problems. Look at the crime stats for central Ballard. Ask the real people who have been threatened with knives, screwdrivers, had their cars and business doors intentionally urinated on because they asked someone to move so they could open their store. And in one case, pistol whipped. Or maybe the person saw the two teenagers doing the heroin nod a half-block from the RV dealing drugs. If you are a woman like me, then you'll understand why sometimes you don't feel safe when you are walking along past areas of unauthorized encampments.

Expressing that reality doesn't mean that someone is against better approaches to helping people out of homelessness. Most people in Ballard would fully support housing first, additional temporary shelters, addiction services, mental health services, outreach workers, etc. But the holier-than-thou crowd, perfectly exemplified here, are so knee-jerk in their response as to be, well, comical. You say "what's your idea for dealing with this" as if you are offering any real solution. Most of you, I'd guess, have no clue about the long history of the city's failed approaches to homelessness. And then, instead of supporting the difficult, but necessary, changes to our approach so that the now nearly $50 million we will spend on homelessness produces measurable and improved outcomes for those on the streets, you'll just mindlessly support the same tired activists pushing for the same failed "solutions."

The Stranger's coverage of this issue is one-dimension and a total joke. You can't wrap your heads around the fact that a lot of residents and businesses in Ballard worked for months to find a larger location for the camp that would have better served the needs of campers and wasn't right on the neighborhood's main street. Usually, that kind of good faith effort to find balance and solutions should be heralded. But here, it's treated as just routine NIMBYism. Instead of building allies in this effort, The Stranger just demands dogma.
Most people in this city are on the same page -- we want to help people in need so we can dramatically reduce the number of people living on our streets. That's definitely true in Ballard.

But calling people a NIMBY and dismissing their experiences just because it doesn't fit a homeless angels narrative is counterproductive. We could be building a bigger coalition of people to support real solutions to this crisis. But you'd all just rather yell at anyone who doesn’t meet your litmus test.
35
@31 Thank you for your very real take. Safety is a real concern that is being ignored by the city. Well....DEF not in other neighborhoods. I lived in the heart of cap hiill for 15 years and there was not nearly the issues that Ballard has.....starting with actual police presence...and a more hidden under society of criminals instead of arrogant open air criminal attitude that just obviously keeps getting worse for any who look into crime stats....and those are only the ones reported. Many do not as a real question asked by SPD......almost always...Are you sure you need us to come out? We are really busy tonight and understaffed. BUT....2 miles away in Queen Anne where my sister lives....be there in 10-30 min. 5 if in progress.

The city council, mayor, and police chief are and have been allowing Ballard to become a dumping ground of Seattle for a a solid 1-2 years now. I have worked with the SPD on several occasions and have been told first hand that they are instructed to turn a blind eye to our homeless criminals and parking/society infractions by this obvious partying crew constantly on the move to create revenue via robbery only basically for their habits. I have heard from MANY neighbors and business owners in Ballard this very same comment from the rare police officers that even stop by South Ballard or the Frelard area. Why would the cops bluntly tell the citizens they are told to do nothing?? I can't figure that one out still.

To not tow rv's parked for months or stop open air drug dealing in the heart of Ballard at 5pm on a summer Tuesday say or go after sewage dumpers, is criminal in it's own as a city in representing it's tax payers. I see parking meter maids and tow trucks WAAAY MORE THAN POLICE that only go after cars that look like they can and will pay the fines.

I'm thinking much larger buildings than an apartment building. This is a "State of Emergency" after all I thought....
36
That's one stupid fucking conspiracy theory. I think I know why you guys couldn't build a coalition with anybody. I think I know why nobody returns your calls. It goes like this:

1. Put all the crime in Ballard!

2. ???

3. Profit!

See how fucking stupid that is? That's you guys. That's why you're so unpopular. Because of how fucking stupid the bill of goods you're selling is. It's like Donald Trump stupid. Ben Carson stupid. That's the flaw in it right there.

Your welcome.

37
We should convert a military barracks, give them medical and psychiatric care, and start moving them there. I'm all for this. Our public spaces have become camp grounds, or worse, crime and disease vectors.

The folks capable of getting back on their feet could get job placement assistance and have an address, shower, and laundry facilities, and the schizos could get their meds ,and be taken off the streets so they don't hurt themselves or others.

It's a terrible idea to have legal weed, a massive heroin epidemic, and a huge number of mentally ill addicts roaming the streets.
38
@25
"What the fuck does 'working among the homeless' mean? You shopping cart retriever when you're not bagging?"

It would be some massive shame to work in grocery store? I'm really confused now.

Then again, the Leftists around here love to characterize blue collar people who don't share their political views as detestable peasants not worthy of the air they breathe. It's more of the "we love the poor/we hate the working class" bullshit they throw at anyone who stops buying their rich hippie propaganda.

If you really must know, though, I work 2 part time jobs hassling people in front of Whole Foods with petitions, and sometimes I play songs on the banjo about transgender whales for tips.
39
@38

So in short, Leftists Are Bad. Vote Republican! Or what? Do you actually think anyone in Seattle is going to vote Republican? Because -- shocker! -- they're actually not. Not even a little.

You're such a huge fucking crybaby whiner and you seem sad. I really wonder whether or not you have a grasp of why nobody here listens to guys like you. Do you get why all this get tough crap is unpopular as fuck? Do you have the basic facts in front of you that explain why your rants against permissiveness are gaining no traction at all? Why the whole city is working in near-unison to do exactly the opposite of what you think is wise? Do you know why that is?

Also, Seattle's "nice areas" are not turning into "dumping grounds". Seattle's former seedy backwaters (Ballard, Capitol Hill, SLU, etc) are gentrifying. You don't even understand what is happening right in front of your face.

This is you: "Joshua built the Pyramids to store grain! Hey... where are you going? Don't you want to hear more? I'm lonely because nobody listens to anything I say." *boo hoo*

I'd be sad too if I was you.
40
@39
I'm not a Republican, but why the hell would I join ranks with folks like you can only throw poop because Jon Stewart said so. Pathetic.
41
@40: Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?
43
@40

"I'm not a Republican" is what all the 21 year old Republicans say. Own it, fucker. Own it.
44
I stopped by the Ballard camp today and actually spoke to the folks installing the "tiny houses" - which are sheds, really. A couple of contractors hired by the city to install the fencing, and a few volunteers from camp itself working on the sheds. The volunteers were preemptively defensive about the whole situation, obviously leery of the neighborhood's vocal dislike of their presence, and assumed possibly that I was one of the assholes commenting above, there to shit on their flow, disparage social workers, or whatever dickheads think about when they hate on the poor.

The sheds - which are painted quite nicely and in no way any uglier than the OSB/Stucco condo's that house the folks freaking out about this - will front the street-side of the property so that the uppity white people speeding by at 40mph won't have their stupid fucking worldview disturbed by the a glimpse of a tent or tarp. The place looks solid, and has pretty stiff rules. Many of the homeless that have traumatized so many folks in the hood by their very presence won't even be able to live there. Because the rules.

In short, this place will be a safe haven for homeless folks who have their shit together, relatively.
45
@29

There's a reason that even public housing advocates no longer defend huge, dense public housing complexes far away from existing residential zoning.

Public housing is probably the only thing that will work, but not if you approach it by building the kind of tenements that cities all over the world have been tearing down for the past 30 years.

And of course there's the small problem of funding. $50 million per year isn't even a tenth of what we'd need to spend to build and maintain sufficient, socially responsible public housing in Seattle.
46
@44 So you get some "street cred" for stopping by in the middle of the day, and "worldview" bonus points. You are right- "stiff rules" may make this an effective model over time (but really is more mandatory to make this work, and are probably going to be hard to maintain and enforce). But the benefit of this experiment should be measured then reassessed. Hopefully they will include less crime in areas around the encampment (including against transients), fewer calls for police for nuisance problems, crime, or behavior; fewer health and safety hazards, and reduced conflicts between transients and others over use of public space.
If we're doing an expesnive social experiment, at least acknowledge we need to measure outcomes, because it may be that this will fail. Maybe the stiff rules won't be followed over time; or if they are, will repel transients who will keep to their own local rule-free space.

But while you ooze with all the wisdom and credibility of a typical Stranger commenter, especially by labeling the "uppity white person with a stupid fucking worldview", you also reek with petty irrelevance. What's your worldview? Won't endure, whatever the fuck it is.
48
Yikes, it's like myballard over here. To state the obvious, there *are* some belligerent and probably criminal homeless people in Ballard, and it's a problem. This has fuck-all to do with Nickelsville, since a) they're already here and b) people like that won't live in encampments. They're completely separate issues, and the only reason to fold them together is if you're prejudiced against homeless people.
49
Is sobriety a camp requirement?
50
Whoever thinks people are whining......if you lived 30 feet from this place and had to listen to the porta poddy doors slamming at all hours of the day and night for YEARS, you wouldn't be so smug. A summer of closed windows is what I'm looking forward to most actually.

But yah know....I really shouldn't be so selfish and should really consider how I could be in that camp......er...wait....Unless I sell my condo for a huge loss as nobody will want it now, I basically live in the camp as it's my only view, smell, and environment now....for YEARS.
51
Although quite a few of the tweakers/street drunks/crazies are homeless, not all the homeless are drunks/tweakers/crazy.
What @31 said about the open drug dealing and crazies threatening people on the street is true. I see it myself fairly often, but it's not the same crowd as the encampments. At least not for the most part, but Ballardites have gotten so fed up of the first crowd that it's not surprising to see some pushback against the second.
The SPD response, or more accurately complete lack of response to the aggro street drunks and tweakers is a real issue. The cops will say that they can't just grab people off the street for looking sketchy, and yeah...that's true. But it's a lazy response. If SPD took more than a second and looked into what those sketchy looking people are doing, they'd pretty quickly see some of the crazy shit that everyone who lives here knows about, like the bike chop shop vans that were taking apart high end road bikes in broad daylight all summer. People would get their bikes stolen, find them at the vans, call the cops, and...no response. Tweaker vans parked around Ballard Commons park for weeks never get a ticket, but if you or I overstay the meter by more than a few minutes you'll be guaranteed to have a ticket waiting for you. There's a ton of burglaries and car prowls all around Ballard. The crazies stumbling down the street yelling "Fuck you! Look at me again and I'll kill you!" to little old ladies are real. I've seen 'em.
Anyway, long winded way of saying that Ballard has a real problem with street drunks/crazies/tweakers that is separate from the homeless camp, but considering how fed up everyone is you can hardly be surprised that people would conflate the two issues. If the city really wanted to make this camp thing go over smoothly they'd do a lot more to address the issues with shitbirds first.
52
@51

Or you guys have zero credibility and nobody takes you seriously. Your imaginary "bike chop shop" is a perfect example. Just listen to yourselves.

Ask yourself why exactly there is a vast conspiracy of the whole city establishment to subject your neighborhood specifically to an onslaught of crime. Ask yourself is that not the dumbest fucking theory since grain in the Great Pyramid. Stop acting like paranoid fucking loons. Stop lying. Start telling the truth and then come back and tell me how nobody listens to you crazy fucks.

It's not just me telling you this. All those hangups? All those ignored emails? All those doors slammed in your faces? Those are your clues, and you're getting clues dropped on you by EVERYBODY. Wake up. The problem is you. You fuckers are full of shit and everyone knows it. That's why you get treated that way.
53
Sometimes bad things happen. Therefor, we should not try to help people.

I do love this developing narrative where there is a conspiracy to ignore all transient crime in ballard, and the only solution is literally to build a huge compound, which we will somehow corral a scattered, sometimes mentally ill populace into, and staff with only the most consistent and compassionate social/health workers in existence.

If this is the reaction to a permanent encampment, how do I lobby for one in my neighborhood? I'd rather walk by a camp every day than step in another pile of shiba inu shit.

Admit it. If there was some news blurb about how a bunch of homeless humans were shoved into shipping containers and sent god knows where, you might be a little angry, and even write a politician. But then you'd go about your day, having felt no real grief for them. There is virtually no one who would be emotionally impacted That's what homelessness is for many people; it's a state of being where a person has no emotional foothold in society, no one who is invested in their well being. For many people, homelessness is being able to die without anyone noticing. Let's face it, with billions of people on this planet, any one of us is expendable. Having a place in a community creates the pleasant, comfortable illusion that we are not.

Those who are mentally well enough to have a community, should. Community is the foundation of the desire to make oneself nonexpendable. People who strive to not be expendable are productive.

It's not like the city of Seattle is deliberately ignoring some easy, obvious option. We are doing the best we can with what we have. Just like all humans in history ever. And it's not like transient people are ignoring some easy, obvious option, either. We all want comfort and safety, and the drive to obtain those things is strong. The encampments aren't a perfect solution to every aspect of homelessness, but when is anything ever a perfect solution?
54
@52, imaginary bike chop shop? Turns out you really don't know shit about homeless camps in Seattle, then? Try walking through one sometime. Nothing imaginary about it. Tweaker-stolen bikes a-plenty.
55
@52, you really don't have a clue. Yes, there was a mobile bike chop shop operating in Ballard in the summer, right outside the post office annex. Several sketchy characters were taking apart bikes and other items and welding together frankenvehicles right on the sidewalk. I have photos of it. On the south side of the post office annex was a tweaker encampment that stretched along half a block; when residents finally got the police to clear it out after several weeks, there was a large amount of trash, needles and human waste left behind.

Right now, just east of the Ballard Bridge along 45th, there's a sprawling encampment of about eight or so tents, along with stolen shopping carts and other items. It's been there for at least a month and is growing. On Wednesday morning, a woman in her 40s was found dead on the street nearby.

The SPD's refusal to address these problems is very real. I've sat in community meeting with city and police officials and heart firsthand that they have been instructed not to break up illegal encampments. They have done that in a few cases, mostly due to repeated complaints from neighbors, but mostly they don't do anything about them. Same with the 150-plus (yes, someone counted) RVs camped out all over Ballard and Frelard. Some of them have been parked around Ballard Commons for literally YEARS (but if you or I overstay a meter for 10 minutes, we'll be guaranteed to get a ticket; it's happened to me. A tweaker van, though; they can stay however long they want to).

As @51 pointed out, Ballardites might have been a little less resistant to the tent encampment if the neighborhood didn't already have the problems it does with tweakers, drunks, crime, trash and theft, and if the SPD was actually responding to these problems before more homeless people are being brought to the area.

We've lived in central Ballard for a decade and the neighborhood's degradation over the past year or two is pretty shocking. Take a look at the FB page Welcome to Murraysville and you'll see photos showing what's been going on. If I lived elsewhere and hadn't seen it firsthand, I might be skeptical too. But for those of us who live in the neighborhood and see these problems up close on a daily basis, they are very real. We are fed up and frustrated with the city's lack of response. So it's not surprising that folks aren't welcoming to the tent encampment, particularly in the location the city so wisely chose, which directly abuts a high-density residential area. Imagine having 50 people living in your backyard for at least a year. You probably wouldn't be thrilled either.
56
I was sitting listening to you paranoid Ballard NIMBYS in neighborhood watch meetings 8 years ago. Same bullshit then as now: rampant crime, hysterical stories about "pushers" (pushers? really? Listen to yourselves, OK?) and violent crime that nobody investigates. And always the SPD doesn't care. The Mayor doesn't care. Always the same. Poor, poor Ballard, the whole city is out to get you -- because! Because why? Just because.

Back then you were all convinced if only you could replace the evil Greg Nickels all would be well. For some reason Nickels had this special reason to conspire with his cronies in the SPD and the city council to push ALL THE CRIME into Ballard. Why? Why would Greg want all the crime in Ballard? Who the fuck knows?

Then guess what? Nickels was out and McGinn was in and again with the conspiracy at city hall to ignore the homeless onslaught that is destroying Ballard and the secret plot to make sure all the crime happens in Ballard. And of course no police in Ballard. No matter who the mayor is, who's on the Council, no matter who the Police Chief is, one thing remains the same: no police in Ballard.

Because reasons!

It was a stupid fucking theory then, and it always was a stupid fucking theory. Nobody believed it, for various reasons like, they have eyes and can see the cops, they can see the homeless people, they can see what's going on and you fuckers are crazy liars. Do you know why the SPD didn't shut down the bike chop shop? Because it's not fucking real. Nobody committed a crime. That's why. Chicken Little? The Boy Who Cried Wolf? You know the story, right? That's why the cops just humor you crazies, smile and nod and say "there there", and go eat a donut. They know your leads never pan out. Crazy loons. If your shtick is too racist and classist for the SPD, you know you've got issues.

Anybody can go back to the archive and read your crazy rants you've been posting for YEARS at myballard.com. Same fucking stupid conspiracy theory. McGinn was out, Murray was in and guess what? Same shit. All the homeless are in Ballard, crime in Ballard is out of control, City Hall won't send any police to Ballard because they WANT crime in Ballard.

Because reasons! Because the key to power in City Hall is you gotta do big favors for TWEAKER VANS!? Try saying it out loud without laughing.

It's a stupid theory and nobody believes it. Notice how you have no allies? Notice how nobody listens to you? It's not just me. You can think I'm the biggest asshole in the world. Ask yourself why NOBODY else listens to your stupid crazy NIMBY conspiracy theory. You never seem to be able to prove Mr. Snuffleupagus exists. Its because you're so full of shit. That's why.

*Spoiler Alert!* When Murray is gone, when Nickelsville Ballard is gone, when everything has changed, one thing will stay the same: the crazy Ballard NIMBYs will be bleating the same kooky bullshit they've been bleating for years.

Give it a rest already. It's not working, nobody's buying it, and you are a laughing stock.
57
LOL at all the small government right wingers who are on here bemoaning the lack of government response to our housing crisis. You guys clearly are uncomfortable with your new relationship with the lower class and you need to get over it. I know you paid a lot of money to gentrify and live in Ballard, but don't expect me to feel sorry for you. If you don't like it you can get out, love it or leave it, etc. haha how do you like them apples?
58
@48
+1

You can't talk about this. The Stranger demographic would prefer to characterize the blue collar workers who know the mess first hand as "idiot Republicans", or if they own property, as "Nimby gentrifiers" who loathe the poor. It's a basic tactic to avoid confronting the reality that bad city policy has created a mess in what was formerly fairly clean neighborhood.

The Cap Hill kids, with their usual "fuck you dad!" attitudes toward people who have seen this occur over the last few years, is just icing on the cake.

Had your bike stolen, your car broken into, or found used needles in your recycling business property?

The typical response around here follows:
"Too bad, you old square, the poor exist and we know you probably had it coming because you don't have a rainbow flag on your porch! Admit you love John McCain!"

If you offer a large scale, organized solution (managed facility) then you're a fascist because you don't believe in "free range addicts" and their right to shit on the street.

59
For what it's worth, EVERY neighborhood in Seattle thinks there's a conspiracy against them. The Central District has people who say it's a "containment zone" for crime. Anything that happens in South Seattle apparently happens because it's a "poor" neighborhood. (I'm from the Midwest. People here do not understand what a poor neighborhood is). West Seattle is regularly up in arms about how neglected they are, and inevitably someone brings up forming their own city.

I could go on, but the common thread is that Seattle is the town where everyone likes to hear themselves speak, everyone thinks they're the smartest kid in the room, and everyone is looking to be the most put-upon. It's like a modern version of the old "queen For A Day" show, but it's everyone, all the time.
60
@59

Put your dress back on. Nobody wants to see the pasties.
61
Liberal_Censorship dear, I have a feeling you lack the fiscal and/or masculine acumen to motivate me to remove much of anything, let alone my dress. Even if I did, I doubt you could figure out my foundation garments. You'd just end up effete and frustrated. Pretty much like you are here on Slog.

I would like to know more about the tiny houses. Do they have electricity? Are they just one room?
62
@56, you really don't have a clue. The mobile chop shop was real - I have photos, as do other people - and the cops finally did bust it. I heard it's now operating in Magnolia. But hey, believe whatever you want. You clearly don't live in the neighborhood and don't have half a clue about what's going on there.

@61, no, the houses don't have electricity and they are just one room. They're basically sheds.
63
@61, I just watched a news story about the encampment and it said the houses do have electricity. But what I heard on Saturday is that the camp organizers hope the city will provide electricity, so I don't think they have it yet.

Also, here's a photo of that imaginary chop shop, which was operating outside the Ballard post office, complete with generator and soldering on the sidewalk: http://on.fb.me/1P4hOFV
64
@56, I never said it was a "conspiracy" against Ballard. I was simply stating the realities of the situation. If you really want to engage on it, fine... The cops are frustrated too. They can't arrest tweakers for just standing around, and since the SPD is a 911 response based system there really isn't a mechanism in place to deal with this type of issue until they're called and by the time they get there it's always too late to do anything about it. The higher ups don't see property crime, especially the underreported types like bike theft to be a priority, let alone something worthy of any follow up so they don't follow up or try to be proactive and shut it down. The same way a car prowl ring that operated here for a few months didn't get busted till they tried that shit in Bellevue. SPD didn't see following up on a smashed window as anything worth doing, even though had they tried they may have prevented another few hundred smashed windows.
The tweaker vans get by because they put up a handicapped tag on their mirror and the meter maids can't ticket them. I have no idea if those tags are legit or stolen, but it's a nice loophole if you want to park in downtown Ballard and never have to move.
The campers park in the industrial areas where the oversize limit doesn't apply. Then they only have to roll a few feet every 72 hours and they're free. Parking enforcement is bound by the rules, so as long as they move every three days they're not breaking the parking law even if they are taking shits on the parking strip.
Ballard has a few places feeding the homeless, which is fine, actually better than fine. BUT, along with the people who may be down or just need a little help now and then are that very small percentage of tweakers/crazies/shitbirds who are causing the trouble.
Conspiracy? No. Just the reality on the ground in our neighborhood. It'd be nice if some of these issues could be dealt with, and no I don't mean busting heads or arresting people for being homeless, but taking care of mental health issues, addiction, property crime, and the piles of shit that are left behind from the campers.

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