(The Center Square) – A new report reveals that over 50% of homeless individuals in Spokane moved there after losing housing and that local policies have turned it into a destination city.
Marbut Consulting conducted the study for the Spokane Business Association and surveyed hundreds of homeless individuals downtown. The company specifically asked where the people were born and lived before losing housing, as the region spends millions addressing the crisis.
Dr. Robert Marbut served as President Donald Trump’s “homelessness czar” from 2019 to 2021, leaving shortly after President Joe Biden took office. He also served in President George H. W. Bush’s office in 1989 and has offered consulting services on homelessness around the country.
Critics question Marbut’s work due to his support for congregate shelters and criticism of the Housing First approach. He wants to leverage funding through a new model that doesn’t rely on federal grants due to policies that prohibit cities from mandating sobriety to receive grant funding.
“We stopped chasing money, and we started chasing results,” Marbut told The Center Square regarding his work in San Antonio, Texas, before releasing this study. “And we did it by saying we’re going to target our money the way we know it will work, not the way HUD tells us to do it.”
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development administers billions of grant dollars annually. However, much of that federal funding prohibits mandatory treatment for people to receive subsidized housing. Marbut said this has tied up funding for wraparound services.
He thinks homelessness could double in Spokane over the next five years if local officials don’t change their approach using other funding pools. Marbut wants to transition to a model that relies on funding through a private-public partnership focused on recovery rather than shelters.
Survey Results
The survey recorded the average age of people unhoused in Spokane, how long they’ve been homeless, where they first lost housing, where they were born, where they attended school and have family.
The average age for someone living unhoused in Spokane was 45.7 years old, with the average length of experiencing homelessness lasting almost nine years, over twice as long as in Seattle.
Out of 403 respondents, 50.2% first experienced homelessness outside of Spokane and moved to the area afterward. About 80% were born outside of Spokane, with approximately 66% born outside of Washington state. Only 26% attended high school in Spokane, and nearly 60% had attended school outside of the state. Around 24% attended in-state but outside Spokane.
Just over 63% of the respondents do not currently or have never had family living in Spokane.
Spokane service providers criticized Marbut’s survey in March when another outlet asked how providers who criticized his survey questions felt about him questioning people’s ties to the area. Some said the questions about where a person graduated from school stigmatized the population and that his polling felt “gross.”
“Yet, 50.2% of the people in Spokane became homeless somewhere else and moved here,” he said. “That has two real negative effects: it’s now moved the person to [having] less of a chance of recovery, and you’re diluting your resources by half for the people who are homegrown.”
Marbut rejected the notion that tracking residency is discriminatory. He said the data is clinically important, pointing at the low recidivism from Spokane County’s Homeward Bound Program that Volunteers of America Eastern Washington uses to reunite individuals with family back home.
Policy Failures & Recommendations
The study outlines “policy failures,” such as HUD prohibiting mandatory treatment for its housing grants, prioritizing shelters over recovery services and relying on a “one-size-fits-all” approach.
Marbut recommended creating a new emergency response that relies on four guiding principles: Prioritizing funding for the most effective providers to expand treatment services, creating paths for those with long-term ties to the region to reunite with family, supporting long-term recovery through programs that help people reenter the workforce, and leveraging outreach teams that focus on individuals who want treatment now and enforce public safety laws when they don’t.
Immediate steps included devoting unrestricted funding toward treatment and recovery services, redirecting 35% of homelessness and housing funding toward a range of programs listed in the study, and creating “clinical tracks” for individuals from Spokane and those who moved there.
The first track would prioritize treatment and recovery services for those with direct connections to Spokane, while the second would focus on case management to achieve family reunification.
“When it’s done right, it’s incredibly cost-efficient,” he said. “If it’s just a Greyhound, they’re being a dump at the other end; they’ll be right back in four months. That doesn’t do anybody good.”
What About The Outliers?
Spokane Police Chief Kevin Hall previously said it could take dozens of engagements before someone accepts services. Some just aren’t willing to accept treatment, but when asked what he thinks the city should do if someone refuses and still asks for a bed, Marbut blamed the system.
“If that’s happening, that means their overall system has been horrible for so long,” Marbut said, referring to low enforcement and housing first policies. “It’s institutionalized lack of engagement.”
According to Spokane’s most recent Point-in-Time count, surveyors recorded more than 2,000 homeless individuals countywide in January 2024 – a more than 100% increase since the 2016 PIT count – and another recent study found that more than 7,000 people have accessed housing services.
Marbut’s report didn’t specifically call for large congregate shelters like Spokane’s former Trent Shelter, which once housed hundreds of people; however, he told The Center Square that those settings would prove safer than a single-room setting for people who frequently use fentanyl.
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Notably, SBA President Larry Stone owns the property where the Trent Shelter was located and used to rent it out to the city, costing taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars every month at the time.
“Those individuals, if they’re put in an individual room without treatment, will die,” Marbut said. “It’s much safer to be in a congregate level.