Seattle: Autonomous Tiny Home Village Pushes Back Eviction to March 2020

Report from Stop the Sweeps and Demand Utopida Seattle on the recent pushing back of an eviction of an autonomous self-organized tiny house village.

Seattle Deputy Mayor Mosley has promised that the village will not be swept and may remain on the current site through March 2020. The City has secured a commitment from the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI) that they will not try to remove the houses, which they claim to own. He expressed some concerns about whether the budget outlined by the village will be adequate, wants the village to commit to allowing case managers to work with residents, and says there are some other details to be worked out, but it is a relief to everyone to have this overview agreed upon. The residents will now be responsible for coming up with the funds to cover utilities and other operating costs which are estimated to be $27,000 through March 2020. If you are so inclined to donate, please follow this link here.
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Puget Sound: Stop the Sweeps!

Don’t Let Your Houseless Neighbors Be Treated Like Garbage

Flyer for printing stopthesweepsflyer

Thousands of people sleep-rough in tents, doorways, or vehicles around the Puget Sound. On any given day they might be forced to give up what little semblance of stability they have by threat of violent arrest and seizure of their few belongings. These sweeps are a never-ending game of whack-a-mole where the only result is to keep the problem out of sight and out of mind, all while inflicting ever-more violence and trauma on those already suffering.

As an avalanche of tech capital pours into the region, more are forced out of their homes and onto the streets every day. This displacement often falls along historic lines of racist and colonial segregation: Indigenous, Black and Brown communities are significantly more likely to be forced out by gentrification and find themselves with nowhere else to go. A nationwide drug epidemic, fueled by massively profitable pharmaceutical companies, magnifies the problems homeless folks already face.
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