PORT ANGELES — The Port Angeles City Council is working to better understand the needs of the homeless and the organizations that support them by hosting a series of presentations from organizations.
The first set of presentations Tuesday night, during the council’s regular meeting, featured Habitat for Humanity Clallam County Chief Executive Officer Colleen Robinson, Salvation Army Capt. Crystal Birks and 4PA Founder, Director and President Joe DeScala.
The presentations aim to prepare the City Council members with as much information as possible for an April 7 workshop focused on homelessness.
“Our vision is a world where everyone has a decent place to live, building homes, community and hope,” Robinson said. “Every action is aligned with this simple powerful mission.”
Habitat for Humanity, which has been in Clallam County for 35 years this year, aims to help people achieve homeownership through a partnership with the future homeowners wherein they help build the home and are then provided affordable mortages.
“Families complete a detailed application (and), once vetted, a blind selection process is conducted by the board of directors,” Robinson said. “The deciding factor typically comes down to need.”
The process to go from application screening to purchasing a home can take as little as four months or up to 18 months, all depending on building, contractors and the weather.
Homelessness exists on a continuum which features the unhoused on one end and homeownership on the other. Since Habitat for Humanity is so close to the homeownership end of the continuum, Robinson said they don’t typically see people all the way through the process of leaving homelessness.
Being “home burdened” is one of the qualifiers of homelessness, Robinson said.
“One in seven Washingtonians pay more than 50 percent of their income on housing,” she said. “That leaves really hard decisions for transportation, medication, medical care, food.”
Other people who would be considered as home burdened are those who share a house with another family, she said.
During Birks’ presentation, she said Salvation Army has shelter and provides emergency disaster personnel but the organization also has thrift stores, provides free meals and showers, has a summer camp for children, and provides financial assistance and transportation assistance.
The Salvation Army in Port Angeles provides breakfast and lunch Monday through Friday and anyone, even those who are not homeless, is welcome to join, she said. About 300 meals are served a week.
The organization also has a designated area for clothing and shoe donations. Anyone who needs something can take what they need from that area. They also distribute donated blankets when they have them.
Salvation Army also has its Hope Market which is open Tuesdays and Thursdays, helping to fill the gaps caused by food insecurity. About 2,000 people were served from the food pantry.
“I will say that most of the people that come in are unhoused friends,” Birks said.
Salvation Army also is known for the holiday meals it provides the day before Thanksgiving and the day before Christmas. This year, about 120 meals were served during each of those holiday gatherings, Birks said.
“One thing that I love to get across to people is that they are people,” Birks said. “One of the most important things that I’ve learned in my eight years of working with our unhoused friends is building that relationship.”
When asked if she’s noticed any trends among the people who go to Salvation Army, Birks said it was all over the board.
“I would say we have our young folks that we have, like I’ve been seeing some really young kids come in, 18 or 19 maybe 20,” she said. “I also have seen a lot of our older people come in, whether they’re the unhoused community or just across the street.”
DeScala presented to the City Council about 4PA’s efforts to clean up abandoned homeless encampments.
While working with homeless people, 4PA has noted that not all homeless are the same, DeScala said.
“There are individuals that are extremely self aware, they’re doing their best not to disrupt the community, they take only what they need, they keep their areas relatively clean and tidy and really they’re not causing any harm for all intents and purposes,” he said.
Other unhoused people, for whatever reasons — mental illness or drug addiction most often — put a strain on the community by engaging in highly destructive behavior.
“I believe what the community is asking for is not cruelty toward these people,” DeScala said. “That’s something that [has] never even entered our minds, but clarity on the city’s approach. They want to know that there’s a strategy in place to address behavior that threatens public health, environmental integrity and safety, especially near businesses and residential areas.”
To help with maintaining environmental integrity, 4PA goes to abandoned encampments, often near creeks, in watersheds and other protected green spaces, to clean them out. The city owns those properties but doesn’t have a system in place to keep them clean, DeScala said.
During the past four and half years, 4PA has removed more than 400,000 pounds of garbage from abandoned encampments. In Tumwater Creek, the organization is removing about 1,500 pounds of garbage a week.
“Our team works six days a week in Port Angeles on city-owned property and even at that pace, unfortunately we’re barely keeping ahead,” DeScala said.
DeScala came to the council with a suggestion for improving the situation: He urged the council to take a look at what other cities have implemented with clear encampment reporting and response protocols.
“A site visit would occur within 48 hours by a city-appointed official, encampments would be ranked on a public health and safety scale to determine urgency, like maybe a one to three or a one to five scale,” DeScala said. “Outreach would be a next to respond offering services and relocation options and if a site ranks really high for public health or environmental risk and individuals at the camp refuse services, a clearly defined enforcement step would follow, including timely trespass notices, coordinated clean up and restoration. The key is clarity.”
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Reporter Emily Hanson can be reached at emily.hanson@peninsuladailynews.com.
