Despite public perception, our region’s homelessness crisis affects our Eastside communities and is not just a Seattle problem. Supportive services, including permanent supportive housing and transitional housing, are part of a suite of proven solutions, but recent implementations on the Eastside have faced undue pushback from angry residents. Providers and experts provide their insights into the opposition and why these facilities are crucial parts of addressing homelessness.
Alison Eisinger gives a slight smile as she reaches off-screen to fetch a visual aid. She returns with a framed photo of two girls on a playground, slightly obscured by her Zoom window reflecting back at me, but easy to see is the joy on her face as she explains, “I refer to these girls as my supervisors.” The girls are residents of a public housing project in New York City, the place where Alison lived before she moved across the country and completed her education in social work and public health at the University of Washington.
She’s now the Executive Director of the Seattle/King County Coalition on Homelessness, an organization that brings service providers around the region together to “advance reasonable solutions and solid program models; to protect and strengthen the civil rights and dignity of people who are homeless and poor; and to accomplish legislative victories that promote housing, human services, and the public good at the local, state...
A person in his 30s who demanded compensation for alleged foreign substances in cup noodles and the absence of meat in stir-fried pork was sentenced to prison in both the first trial and the appel...