The state dismissed the city’s deadlines on the same day the city renewed demands the shelter on WSDOT property be removed.
In a strongly worded rebuke, state agency leaders took the city to task for playing politics and failing to work on constructive solutions for Camp Hope. The September 20 public letter, signed by the administrators of Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT), Commerce Department and State Patrol, comes in response to a September 8 notice from the city that set a mid-October deadline for the removal of the camp and notified the state that the camp would be classified as a nuisance property.
On the same day the state responded to the city’s timeline, the fire marshal also issued a new warning about the ongoing operation of the tent erected across the street from Camp Hope as a cooling shelter in late July. That letter said that the large tent, which was converted to a supply tent and host site for outreach services as the threat of extreme heat lessened, must be brought down by September 22 or face daily fines of $536.
“We are not taking down the tent,” said Julie Garcia, the founder and executive director of Jewels Helping Hands, which helps Camp Hope operate.
This recent volley of letters is part of an ongoing blame game between the city administration and state agencies. Spokane Mayor Nadine Woodward has repeatedly expressed frustration with the state for allowing the encampment to grow on state land. The state has countered that the city’s inadequate response to the homelessness crisis led to the creation of Camp Hope in the first place, and that they won’t disband the camp until local leaders bring more housing and shelter options online.
The state’s letter has multiple challenges to the city’s leadership and its role in moving people forward from Camp Hope. “Sadly, to date the city seems more preoccupied with blaming the state for the problem it ultimately played a hand in creating and not acknowledging its own roles and responsibilities regarding residents of its own city,” the letter read. It also calls out the mayor more directly, “Continuing to blame the state does not actually make that narrative true no matter how many times you repeat it to the press and elsewhere. The city — starting with the Mayor — is more preoccupied by optics than action.”
Beyond the rhetoric and challenge to the city’s leadership on this issue, the letter shows the state taking a more active role in policing and beginning the process of moving people off of the encampment — a role the city was clearly pressuring the state to step into earlier this month.
WSDOT-WSP-Commerce Response to City of Spokane by RANGE on Scribd
