Spokane may be out of the Trent homeless shelter by October

Spokane Mayor Lisa Brown hopes to fulfill one of her top campaign promises – closing the city-run homeless shelter on Trent Avenue – by October.

Entering a multiyear lease for the former trucking warehouse and operating it as a shelter that housed as many as 400 people who are homeless in one building was one of the worst fiscal and policy mistakes of the prior administration, Brown argued on the campaign trail last year. The large site has also been widely unpopular with members of the Spokane City Council, who questioned whether the city could afford to spend as much as $1 million per month since the facility saw few exits into permanent housing, while others raised concerns that conditions at the site were inhumane.

Brown has advocated instead for much smaller “scatter site” shelters to be dispersed throughout the city, a model that had a sort of trial run early this year as the city turned to churches to temporarily house a couple dozen people each during a cold snap. Her administration has for months been preparing a citywide audit of homeless shelters, transitional housing and other programs, which is expected to become public later this month and is meant to provide an overview of what services exist and where there are gaps.

In December, as Brown prepared to take office, the Spokane City Council declined to contract with the Salvation Army to operate the city’s largest homeless shelter for an entire year, but instead agreed to have the organization operate the facility through the end of April. The number of beds at the facility, which fluctuated dramatically during former Mayor Nadine Woodward’s administration, was also reduced from 350 to 250.

That contract was extended Monday through the end of the month, and the Brown administration will ask in coming weeks for an extension through September, said Dawn Kinder, director of Spokane’s Neighborhood, Housing and Human Services division. On May 13, the administration also expects to request proposals from nonprofits or other organizations seeking to operate a few of the new scatter site shelters, as well as the linchpin of the new system Brown envisions, a navigation center.

Navigation centers are meant to be a first stop for the homeless, both a temporary shelter and a guide through the often complicated network of providers and programs.

That facility and some new small shelters are expected to come online in August and September, Kinder said. They are expected to serve as a pilot before more investments are made.

Those may prove tricky as the city attempts to navigate a $25 million hole in its budget. The city has $4 million made available by the state Legislature during the transition out of the Trent shelter.

The city may still keep the Trent shelter available as a backup during next winter in the event of a weather emergency, Kinder added.

Woodward entered into a five-year lease with real estate developer Larry Stone in 2022 for $26,100 per month, plus a 2.5% lease management fee. The city can exit the lease early, but at the cost of eight months of rent.