It's time to establish a plan of action to address the continuing crisis of unsheltered homelessness and tent encampments in Seattle. Charter Amendment 29 does exactly this and you can help it qualify for the November election.
Nearly six years ago the city and county governments declared homelessness an emergency, yet the crisis rages on with approximately 3,700 people living outside in parks, playgrounds, sports fields, and on sidewalks and streets. What’s more, there is no plan in place to eliminate the need for people to sleep outside; the encampments have essentially become permanent. Charter Amendment 29 establishes a compassionate, person-centered plan to bring people indoors by expanding access to urgently needed behavioral health treatment services for mental health and substance use disorders and creating new emergency housing units.
Charter Amendment 29 petitions are now available for registered Seattle voters’ signature. We need 33,060 valid signatures by June 25th to qualify for the November ballot. You can help us reach this goal.
Be Part of the Solution. Sign the Petition Today
Download the petition, print it (with black ink, both sides on a single sheet of paper), sign it yourself, and then get signatures from your neighbors, colleagues, friends and family members. Only registered Seattle voters can sign.
Compassion Seattle, an alliance of neighborhood and business leaders and many of Seattle’s nonprofit organizations serving people experiencing homelessness, is spearheading the drive to get Charter Amendment 29 on November’s ballot. We’re unwilling to settle for the status quo, unwilling to let people sleep outside. We can do better!
The amendment creates a new outcome-based plan of action that:
- Increases mental health and substance use disorder treatment services.
- Creates a behavioral health rapid-response capability as an alternative to police response in some situations.
- Creates 2,000 new units of emergency housing within 12 months, such as enhanced shelter spaces, tiny houses, hotel/motel rooms, and other forms of temporary housing. The measure waives building permit fees, expedites siting, and refunds the city’s portion of the sales tax for these projects. Establishes, as services are available, a plan to keep city parks, playgrounds, sports fields, public spaces, and sidewalks and streets open and clear of encampments.
- Affirms the ability to close encampments with public health or safety risks or those that obstruct use of public spaces.
- Requires identification of the causes of racial disproportionality among the unsheltered population, a serious problem in our city, and to take action to reduce it.
- Establishes a dedicated fund in the city treasury for human services, including homelessness services, and to accept outside contributions from the public, businesses, philanthropy and other government entities.
- Requires that 12% of the city’s general fund be allocated to human services programs, including those serving the unsheltered population. (This year 11% of the general fund is earmarked for these services.)
- Requires the city to invest in, support, and cooperate with the new Regional Homelessness Authority.
- Expires in six years, in December 2027.
There is opposition to this effort from some, but those who object don't have a plan to solve this crisis; their opposition perpetuates the status quo. And the status quo is harmful to those living outside and, in some cases, blocks access to parks, sidewalks and other public spaces. We have been paralyzed on this crisis for far too long. It's time to implement a reasonable, specific plan of action.
As we work to emerge from the pandemic and rebuild our local economy, the widespread presence of tents downtown and in our neighborhood business districts hinders — and potentially derails — our recovery, especially for our retail, hospitality and tourism sectors.
This isn’t a zero-sum game; we can help those living unsheltered by increasing behavioral health services and providing more emergency housing, and, at the same time, take steps to make sure our economic recovery is strong and sustainable.
Download and sign the Charter Amendment 29 Petition NOW. Help qualify this important measure for the November ballot.
To learn more, visit www.compassionseattle.org.