Plan To End Street Homelessness By November Moves Ahead

PIERCE COUNTY, WA — The Pierce County Council is moving ahead with a plan to end on-street homelessness in the county by the start of November.

At the County Council's meeting Tuesday night, council members voted unanimously in favor of adopting Resolution No. R2021-82, which helps set the stage for a new, comprehensive approach to the homelessness crisis in Pierce County.

Under that resolution, the county's Department of Human Services has been directed to create a long-term response to homelessness, which will be presented to the Council in December. But while the department crafts that long-term solution, it will also be asked to create a more immediate "shelter plan" to rapidly increase the county's available shelter space and accommodate all remaining unsheltered Pierce County residents by Nov. 1.

Now that the resolution has passed, Director of Human Services Heather Moss says that shelter plan should be finished in the summer, and reviewed and funded by September or October at the very latest.

One of the biggest hurdles facing the department will be determining how much shelter space the county needs. Normally, the annual Homeless Point-In-Time Count study gives a reliable estimate of the number of sheltered and unsheltered people experiencing homelessness, but due to the pandemic the 2021 Point-In-Time Count did not account for unsheltered residents — leaving some big questions about how much shelter the county's plan will need to provide.

The 2019 count found 322 people were living outdoors in Pierce County, though that number has likely grown during the pandemic.

As for the long-term solution to homelessness, county leaders like Council Chair Derek Young stress that their work is still in the very early stages.

"This is by no means the plan we're adopting here, this is basically accepting those initial recommendations and instructing the staff and the work group to continue forward," said Young. "I don't want anyone to think we have declared victory here, this is going to be a long process."

>> Read the full text of Resolution No. R2021-82