RV residents who violate the permit terms— for example, by declining shelter too many times or failing to “comply with all laws”—would permanently forfeit their right to park overnight in Seattle. 

By Erica C. Barnett

City Councilmember Dan Strauss is proposing legislation that will prohibit people from parking RVs on Seattle streets for more than two hours at a time without a permit, including in the industrial areas that are currently the only place RVs can be legally parked overnight.

The legislation would require everyone living in an RV or “fifth wheel” trailer to apply for a permit with the city; only people who are the registered owners of RVs with up-to-date registration would be eligible to apply, and only people counted in a one-time “census” of every RV in the city would be eligible for a permit, which would cap the program at an estimated 400 to 500 people citywide.

As a condition of the permits, RV residents would be required to enroll in case management and eventually go into housing or shelter. Under the legislation, if an RV resident violates any of the permit requirements or “turns down offers of appropriate shelter” more than five times, they will lose their permit and forfeit their right to park inside the city.

“Appropriate” is not defined in the legislation, and it’s unclear who will decide what counts as appropriate. It’s a truism among homeless service providers that people don’t generally turn down shelter that works for their needs, so by definition, a housing or shelter offer that someone turns down is inappropriate for that person at that time.

The goal, Strauss told PubliCola on Monday, is to get everyone currently living in RVs to move to a sanctioned “safe lot,” a shelter, or permanent housing, and to eliminate RVs from city streets.

“Through this framework, we are being really clear about what is and is not going to be an option,” Strauss said. “If you live in the city of Seattle in your RV while we get additional safe lots stood up, you’ll need to have a permit, and when we have safe lots stood up, you need to live in a safe lot if you want to live in an RV.”

“We want to be able to say, in a year from now, ‘We are no longer allowing motor homes and fifth wheels on our streets.'”

Permitted RV residents would have to park in the geographic area where they receive their permits. Strauss said this provision ensures outreach workers can locate their clients; however, no similar provision applies to people living in tents, on the street, or in other types of vehicles, who can move freely about the city.

Strauss’ plan would provide funding for a new safe lot for RVs whose owners are ready to move into shelter or housing; a separate RV storage lot for those want the ability to go back to their vehicles if shelter doesn’t work out; and seven more Unified Care Team members to coordinate with outreach workers who work with vehicle residents.

The Unified Care Team is a team of city employees, vastly expanded under Bruce Harrell, that removes encampments and, in some cases, refers their displaced residents to available shelter beds.

Strauss’ plan to expand RV parking and shelter would cost $3.5 million a year on an ongoing basis, with a funding boost of $1.5 million at the beginning of implementation to get the program going. The money has already been set aside in the budget, thanks to previous actions by Strauss, but could be spent on other purposes if the council decided not to use it for the RV residence program.

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A spokesman for Mayor Katie Wilson’s office said Wilson is “supportive in principle of new safe lots, storage and additional outreach.” However, he added, Wilson’s office “has shared operational and policy concerns about the details of the permit program, and continue[s] to review the current legislation.”

Strauss worked with Vehicle Resident Outreach, a project run by the University Heights Center, on the legislation. Jen Manlief, the VRO program manager, called the legislation “a step in the right direction” that provides “places for people to be. It’s not just hiring people to put bandaids on things.”

Currently, Manlief said, “there’s a lot of RVs and there’s nowhere for them to be. What we’re doing now as outreach workers is chasing them around the city and not solving anything.”

But other homeless advocates have expressed concern about the more punitive elements of the proposal, which could result in vehicle impoundments that lead to an increase in street homelessness. For example, one of the ordinances expresses an “intent” to give unpermitted RV owners up to three warnings before towing away their homes, but explicitly allows “impounding of motor homes and travel trailers without notice.”

Alison Eisinger, director of the Seattle/King County Coalition on Homelessness, said, “We appreciate Councilmember Strauss’ proposal to assist people living in RVs through additional dedicated safe parking, skilled outreach, and the idea of a vehicle storage program.”

However, she added, “we have significant concerns about his suggested permit program, which as written is punitive and likely unworkable. What would happen to people who miss the one-time opportunity to get a permit, whose circumstances change, or who start living in an RV after the permitting process is closed?”

It’s also unclear what will happen if there’s insufficient shelter for people who do get the permits. In San Francisco, a similar temporary RV permit system had to be extended because there weren’t enough places for people living in RVs to go.

Strauss said he believes people who want to live in their vehicles, rather than coming into shelter, will figure out a way to comply with the law, possibly by moving into smaller vehicles. “Humans are very smart, and if they’re certain they need to live in their vehicle in the city of Seattle, they will likely find a vehicle that is not as unique as an RV, in terms of size, space, and hazardous materials, where they can continue to live in their vehicle,” Strauss said.

Strauss’ legislation anticipates that RV residents will get direct, dedicated access to tiny houses, a model that has worked well at Salmon Bay Village—a now-dismantled safe lot with 11 tiny houses operated by the Low Institute Housing Institute in Interbay. The village was replaced by an indoor pickleball complex; LIHI plans to open a larger safe lot in West Seattle, the Glassyard Commons, in November, with space for 72 vehicles and 20 tiny houses.

LIHI director Sharon Lee said 60 percent of the 87 people who lived in Salmon Bay Village over 18 months went on to permanent housing; according to one-pager on the village, LIHI was able to permanently dispose of 67 RVs.

“Salmon Bay showed that people are happy to get out of their rundown RVs and into a clean, habitable, nice tiny house with a kitchen and hygiene and all of the amenities,” Lee said.

Currently, Lee noted, many RVs get reused after they’re impounded by the city, showing back up on city streets in worse condition than before. “You can’t just keep people living in their rundown RV,” Lee said. “The important thing is that rundown RVs should be destroyed and not reused.”

The legislation sets up many pitfalls that could make RV residents ineligible for permits or cause them to lose a permit after it’s issued, including expired tags, visible trash, or leaving a pet tied up outside and “unattended.” The bill also requires RV residents to “comply with all laws,” a vague but all-encompassing directive. It also stipulates that the only people who will be eligible for permits are those counted in a one-time “census” by the city’s Human Services Department; any vehicle residents who aren’t included in that count, including those who arrive in Seattle or starts living in an RV later, would be violating the law.

Permit holders would be allowed to park in industrial areas for up to 72 hours, the time limit that applies to all on-street parking in the city. They’d still risk losing their vehicles if they break down and can’t be moved, just like today.

A resolution accompanying the five ordinances Strauss is proposing expresses the city’s commitment to “removing eco-blocks currently placed in City right-of-way” within six months. These large concrete blocks have proliferated all over industrial parts of Ballard, which Strauss represents, as well as parts of SoDo, West Seattle, other neighborhoods—placed illegally in city rights-of-way by businesses who don’t want RVs parking outside.

“Removing the eco-blocks gives the RVs a place to be, which is something we’ve been fighting for for the last five years,” Manlief said. However, the resolution does not say who would be responsible for removing eco-blocks or identify any enforcement mechanism to ensure it actually happens.

Lee says the proposal strikes a good balance between providing new places for people living in RVs to relocate and getting RVs off the streets of Seattle. “I think it creates an incentive for long-term RV dwellers to move into shelter and tiny houses or housing—or, for that matter, to be receiving help to reunite with family or friends,” Lee said.

The council’s public safety committee discussed Strauss’ proposal for the first time on Tuesday. Strauss has said he plans to bring the bills back to committee on September 22, after the council’s annual August recess. It’s an ambitious timeline. Homeless advocates will likely push the council to spend time making the bill less punitive toward RV residents, and the council will be working by then on next year’s budget, which generally occupies most of their attention through November.