I remember the Mad Housers in Atlanta 25 years ago, doing something similar, simple structures to house people, something better than a tent and less visible that a bedroll in a doorway. But can we not do better than that in 2021?
Sound Foundations and other builders are producing 100 tiny houses, expected to hold up to 130 people, this summer. The houses will sit on two sites in North Seattle and potentially double the size of a village in Interbay. The Port of Seattle owns the Interbay property and has to approve the expansion.
Seattle included these villages as part of its record $167 million 2021 homelessness budget. The materials for each house normally cost around $2,500, although they’re $4,500 right now because of a national lumber shortage, according to Josh Castle, advocacy and community engagement director for the Low-Income Housing Institute, the city’s main contractor for village operations. It costs an average of $600,000 a year to run each village, with case management and food, Castle said.
$167 million dollars for 2021? How much would it cost to build real housing on one of the many vacant parcels in Seattle and get folks re-integrated into society instead of these pre-fab slums? What could be built with that money that would last more than the few years these wooden structures will endure? If the 12,000 estimate of Seattle’s homeless is reasonable, that’s $14,000 per person for this year alone. I can’t believe there isn’t a more permanent solution that would also create market rate/social housing.
Ideally, this is part of a larger conversation about land use and growth for the next 25 years or so. But a city that gave up billions in revenue from the Mercer Megablock isn’t likely to change its ways.