Ellen Picken: Providing help for unhoused will make community safer for us all

By Ellen Picken

Today I saw a three-legged porcupine. A few years ago, she had been caught in a jaw trap and the trap was caught in a fence. She was emaciated, afraid and difficult to approach. But enough people had the compassion to help her out and provide her a place to rehabilitate.

If you don’t start with some wealth, it is too easy to fall into the trap of poverty. A medical setback, an undiagnosed mental illness, a divorce, combat trauma or injury, job loss, a forest fire, an abusive home, elderly isolation, even debt which most Americans are weighed down by can force anyone onto the street. Veterans, who gave everything for our safety, make up a large percentage of people you see under downtown bridges.

The housing market is another trap.

Under current market norms, developers, corporations or individuals can build expensive housing in any neighborhood or inflate the cost of existing housing. This is driving the middle class itself out of home ownership.

For the middle class, fear of association with poverty is common. When people do not feel stable in their own home any cracking of the façade of security causes anxiety. The fear of property theft or property value declining reminds us of our precariousness. It is easier to scapegoat the poor than it is to recognize our instability. Most people can hardly afford their mortgage, car payments, utilities, and basic cost of upkeep. We may depend on our neighbor to borrow a cup of sugar but know they cannot pay our bills in a hard month. How many young working couples can afford a home? How many elderly live alone, surrounded by neighbors? How many people are in bad relationships with nowhere to turn? How close are we to losing our homes or ending up alone? “We” can too easily become “them.”

Every neighborhood in Spokane is vulnerable to market forces. An “affordable” $180,000 home has become an out of reach $400,000 real estate investment seemingly overnight. Preventing the underclass from living near you will not maintain your security. By shunning the poor and herding them into industrial zones, we risk solidifying their place in society. More and more people will be born into poverty and slip into poverty, our own families and neighbors not excluded.

It takes more effort to release our leg from the trap than it does to set it off. And we can not rely on the ones who set the trap to free the ones caught in it. We have to take responsibility for a situation we don’t feel responsible for. That requires approaching the pain and facing our fear with love.

Changing our for-profit housing system into guaranteed homes for each other is a long and difficult process. In the meantime, people are really suffering on the streets. To create security in our communities, we can start by letting go of an every-man-for-himself perspective to embracing a sharing economy. I support converting hotels into transitional housing with counselors and health professionals. As a taxpayer, I am happy to put my resources toward building affordable communities. People need a safe place to sleep and wash their bodies. They need to feel like they are worth something to the rest of society to escape debilitating depression. They, we, need to feel loved in order to stay alive.

There are proposed transitional housing and palette housing units to be installed near my neighborhood. Some of our neighbors might say, “What about that time the guy living in the trailer ended up in the other neighbor’s backyard stoned out of his mind? Do you want more of that?” My response is that, yes I was afraid of this situation too, for his safety and the rest of ours. But he ended up unhoused because he had nowhere else to go. People will end up in our neighborhood in unhealthy ways if we don’t provide help for them. There may be risks, but doing nothing will guarantee the problem grows. These two housing options are not enough. We need more.

This particular location is a good start. It is on a bus line not far from resources, it is in a quiet, safe place, not in the middle of a neighborhood but not in an industrial zone, and the building is in good condition. The hotel will house around 100 people on their way to more permanent housing. It is a meager start, but we have to start with whatever resources we have available. Even if it is near my home.

When we are confronted with the pain of others our biological response is to recognize the pain in our own bodies. Avoidance and disgust are natural reactions. If we can’t see the cause of their torment we blame the person suffering for their situation. Yes, someone may turn to other forms of pain to mask the underlying problem. This is the only power they have left to wield. What is the larger reason why so many of our citizens are falling to the streets? What power do we have as neighbors and how will we use it? With love or fear?

Ellen Picken is a lifelong resident of Spokane. She is a small business owner, artist and volunteers in the community in her free time.