SPOKANE, Wash. — Spokane is no stranger to the struggles of homelessness. Some local non-profits say solving a big problem could take a "small" solution.
"We have a housing crisis in Spokane," Smith-Barbieri Foundation Executive Director Lerria Schuh said. "We need to do some innovative things to lower our houseless population and a tiny home village has been really successful and communities around the country. and it's time that we look at doing it here."
Schuh and other non-profit leads traveled to Seattle to learn more about tiny homes and even built one themselves.
"It felt really, really good to see that and to know that somebody is going to sleep in the tiny home that we built and they're going to rejuvenate their lives," Schuh said.
Schuh says the western Washington homeless solution also has potential on the eastern side of the state.
She believes it's a real stepping stone to getting people off the streets and into housing.
"If houseless folks move into a tiny home village, the average stay in Seattle is 114 days before they get housed somewhere else," Schuh said. "So, it's really a type of transition. It's not meant to be permanent."
Sound Foundations Northwest is a Seattle non-profit that has helped design hundreds of tiny homes. The director of operations says their design costs a little over $4,000 per unit.
According to the Low Income Housing Institute, under Seattle City Code, tiny homes need to be under 120 square feet. So, most designs are just eight by twelve feet.
Despite the name, a lot can go into a tiny home.
"An overhead light, an electrical outlet, and in the wintertime, they're given a space heater," Schuh said. "And in the summer times, a fan with two windows for good air circulation. Each unit has a bed and typically some sort of a storage structure."
Schuh says the group has a few more details to work out before bringing the idea to the city.
"We know that services are really important and we need to make sure that service providers have the capacity to help to be on site, you know, and things like where they could be located and all of that," Schuh said. "So, we haven't talked to the city yet, but we we believe very strongly that this is something that should happen here."
But, they're hopeful they can bring tiny homes to eastern Washington.
"We're going to be sitting down and talking about what the feasibility is where there might be land, who might be able to be involved to help fund and operate a tiny home village and go from there," Schuh said.
The low income housing institute operates 19 tiny home villages in western Washington. According to the organization, 65% of people stay less than six months in a tiny home before moving on to permanent housing.
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