Tonight, Deputy Mayor Darryl Smith is hosting two public meetings on the city-sponsored homeless encampment slated for the Sunny Jim Peanut Butter factory in SoDo. The meetings will address public concerns, answer questions, and hopefully give residents a detailed breakdown of how the city plans to execute this ambitious project. The first meeting is for business owners and will run from 5:30 to 7:00 p.m. at the City of Seattle sign shop (4200 Airport Way). The second is for the general public and will run from 7:30 to 9 p.m. at the Showbox SoDo (1700 First Ave S). But before you go, you should read these two pieces on why a permanent site is necessary.

Via the Seattle Times:

This idea deserves support for two reasons. One is the extraordinary need in the community. As many as 2,000 homeless spend each night in makeshift shelters around the city, tucked under freeways or in doorways and alcoves framed off by cardboard.

Second, Seattle is working to provide permanent housing for struggling men, women and families. In 2009, community and tax-supported efforts added 1,065 units of low-income housing. McGinn's proposal is part of a solution, not the only solution in play.

City council members have argued that we should be focusing our energy and resources on getting homeless people into housing, and everyone can agree this is the ideal—getting everyone off the streets and into housing. But according to Bill Block, programming director of the Committee to End Homelessness, King County has added 4,000 units of affordable housing over the past five years—since the county's 10-year plan to end homelessness was first launched—and it hasn't put a noticeable dent in the number of homeless individuals known to be living on the streets. This number has hovered between 2,000 and 2,700 for the past six years, according to the One Night Count (an annual nighttime tally of homeless individuals sleeping outside).

Meanwhile, Tim Harris, executive director of the homeless advocacy newspaper Real Change, has a great editorial about Nickelsville's brutal history with the city—tents slashed, belongings confiscated, homeless people arrested—which shows how the city's policies have changed since McGinn became mayor and why a permanent homeless encampment with on-site social services and housing aid is a step in the right direction to getting people off the streets:

The establishment of a permanent Nickelsville site is evidence that finally, after years of denial, the city has come to grips with ugly reality. The deluge of homelessness has outpaced our ability to keep up, and in this time of universal deficit budgets, this is unlikely to change soon.

In recognizing this, we have chosen to help instead of hurt those whom the system has failed. We have stopped letting ideals of excellence — the notion that “tents are no solution and people need housing” — get in the way of good. Survival camping and an overwhelmed shelter system are the reality. Deal with it.