Encampment removals aren't slowing, the mayor says. Strauss wants to restore Unified Care Team cuts anyway
Kettle says the $37 million shelter plan isn't at risk but expects limits on how it's spent. Rivera wants the regional homelessness authority dissolved. Here's what's on the budget table.
Mayor Katie Wilson told reporters the city's Unified Care Team has "continued doing encampment removals at basically the same rate" as before she took office, according to a PubliCola column published Monday. The column, by Josh Feit, says the mayor's office counted 151 removals from January through September of this year, compared with 112 in the same months of 2022, Mayor Bruce Harrell's first year. PubliCola's excerpt does not name the source of the tallies.
At the same time, councilmembers are lining up changes to the money behind the mayor's homelessness plan. KOMO reported Monday that Public Safety Chair Robert Kettle does not think her $37 million shelter expansion is at risk, but expects amendments limiting how it is spent. "I don't think it's at risk," Kettle told KOMO.
For residents, these budget lines decide how many new shelter beds open, how fast encampments and RVs are cleared, and who cleans up afterward.
What our records add: the Unified Care Team proposals
The Unified Care Team (UCT) is the city's multi-department group that removes tents and RVs and cleans the sites. The mayor's budget trims it in several places. Wednesday's proposal packets show two items from Budget Chair Dan Strauss (District 6), both co-sponsored by Debora Juarez (District 5) and Robert Kettle (District 7):
- SPR-019 (Parks packet): $510,000 a year to restore money for encampment cleanup supplies and services, and authority for 2.5 positions. Parks runs the UCT's north field operations, covering Districts 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7. The packet says the positions, two administrative assistants and a half-time communications strategist, were added in 2023 and never filled; their full-year cost would be about $391,000, which the item does not fund.
- SDOT-011 (SDOT packet): restores authority for two vacant maintenance laborer jobs in the transportation department, which runs the UCT's south field operations in Districts 1 and 2. These were also added in 2023 and never filled. The item adds no money, so they could be filled only if funding appears later; the department puts their full cost at about $618,000.
A third UCT cut, $603,000 in Human Services Department support, appears in the Council's Human Services memo from Oct. 15. Thursday's Human Services proposals, where any changes to the $37 million shelter money would show up, had not been posted as of Tuesday morning.
The shelter money. The same memo says the mayor's budget, combined with money already in 2026, adds up to a $36.9 million increase for shelter, expected to support about 960 new or expanded beds by the end of 2027. We covered that plan in Mayor Wilson takes the Pioneer Square homelessness pilot citywide.
Other positions on the record
- Rob Saka (District 1) wants a new shelter for veterans in West Seattle, which he described to KOMO as "brand new, purpose-built, professionally operated."
- Maritza Rivera (District 4), the budget committee's vice chair, supports dissolving the King County Regional Homelessness Authority, KOMO reported, pointing to an outside audit that found nearly $17 million in missing money. "That $17 million could have gone to things like treatment," she told KOMO. We covered the authority's shortfall in The regional homelessness agency's $16.7 million hole.
What's next
- Wednesday, Oct. 28: the Parks and SDOT items above are presented (meeting).
- Thursday, Oct. 29: Human Services, CARE and Police proposals (meeting, Human Services agenda item).
- Nov. 4: Strauss's balancing package. Nov. 5: public hearing.