Federal homelessness director says pandemic exacerbated crisis, provided lessons for Seattle, U.S.

For years, the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness has convened public officials and experts and done research on best practices for cities and counties to deal with a growing national homelessness crisis.

It is the only federal agency solely focused on preventing and ending homelessness, but has little power to implement policy or hand out funding. That has left cities and counties mostly on their own to respond to homelessness in the U.S.

Then, the pandemic brought with it an infusion of billions of dollars in federal funding specifically to address homelessness in the United States. Many cities have invested heavily in shelter and long-term housing. Some have also passed stricter anti-camping laws in hopes of reducing the number of people living outside, creating a patchwork of increased services and increased penalties across the country. 

Jeff Olivet, a longtime consultant on race and social issues, became executive director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness during this time and visited King County while on a tour of the West Coast, a region where he says  there have been “pretty dramatic, troubling increases” in homelessness. 

He met with the Regional Homelessness Authority and public officials from Seattle and throughout King County, as well as visited encampments to “understand the crisis that’s going on in Seattle right now around unsheltered homelessness and lack of affordable housing.”