Tag: Continuum of care

“I Regret Falling Into the Trap”: Former Homelessness Board Member Reflects on Controversy Over Sex Offender that Led to Her Ouster

King County Regional Homelessness Authority logo

By Erica C. Barnett

Last week, the King County Regional Homelessness Authority gathered the members of its Continuum of Care (CoC) membership to vote on new members and a new charter for the Continuum of Care Board, a volunteer committee that, among other duties, oversees the KCRHA’s annual application for tens of millions of dollars in federal funding.

The online-only “convening,” whose public portion lasted less than 30 minutes, came on the heels of an explosive meeting earlier this year at which one of the CoC Board’s co-chairs, Shanéé Colston, yelled at another member, Kristina Sawyckyj, who objected to the appointment of a sex offender to the board. Sawyckyj, who said the nominee had also touched her inappropriately, went silent and left the meeting after Colston and another board member told her that her comments were out of order.

“We have no right to out anyone in this space,” Colston said. “I’m telling you that you cannot talk like that in this meeting. I will not have that here! If anyone wants to talk like that you will be muted and removed from this meeting.”

“This is about equity. And everyone—everyone— deserves housing. I don’t care if they’re a sex offender!” Colston continued. “This is an inclusive space, and we are equitable to all.” Another board member, Kristi Hamilton, defended the nominee and told Sawyckyj she should go to the police if she had a crime to report but that it wasn’t appropriate for her to raise those concerns in a public board meeting.

Colston told PubliCola she received death threats from around the world after the story about her comments went viral. She said she regrets “falling into the trap, and… that I was not prepared and I responded in reaction to [Sawyckyj’s comments] and not in thought.”

PubliCola reported on the meeting in May. Over the next few weeks, our story was picked up (and distorted) by right-wing media worldwide, spreading from local FOX affiliates to the New York Post to the Daily Mail. A Change.org petition, which falsely stated that the board approved the sex offender’s nomination—in reality, he withdrew his application—called for Colston’s removal “from all leadership positions” at the authority.  Many of the articles about the incident used racist language to portray Colston as a stereotypical angry Black woman lashing out at a meek white colleague (described by the Daily Mail as a “wheelchair-bound mother”) on behalf of a “child rapist.”

Colston told PubliCola she received death threats from around the world after the story about her comments went viral. She said she regrets “falling into the trap, and… that I was not prepared and I responded in reaction to [Sawyckyj’s comments] and not in thought.”

At the height of the uproar, KCHRA chief program officer Peter Lynn sent Colston a letter demanding she resign, which she refused to do. Last week’s election accomplished the same result by prematurely terminating Colston’s three-year term.

According to Colston, she and other board members were not aware that Crowfoot was a sex offender “until it was announced (by Sawyckyj) that day,” and said that the committee that reviewed board applications before bringing them to the full board rejected several applicants because of their past behavior—including drinking on the job and using housing vouchers “to manipulate women,” according to Colston.

“I asked for her to be muted on her mic as it’s not the responsibility of a victim to have to be vulnerable and publicly announce their trauma to the world,” Colston said, “and it was breaking the rules” of the board. “I don’t agree he or others should have a seat of power on this CoC Board,” she continued, “but the voices of their experience with being homeless have to be heard, listened to, and some form of plan implemented to end homelessness [for them] as well.

“I don’t agree [the sex offender] or others should have a seat of power on this CoC Board, but the voices of their experience with being homeless have to be heard, listened to, and some form of plan implemented to end homelessness [for them] as well.

When she said that everyone, including sex offenders, deserve to be housed, Colston said she was identifying a well-known problem—sex offenders, as well as convicted arsonists, are systematically denied access to shelter and affordable housing, forcing many into unsheltered homelessness.

“When I stated that I was glad that he was there, it means that arsonists and sex offenders are a very vulnerable population” Colston said. “If KCRHA is really centering the Theory of Change and listening to those with lived experience to end homelessness for all, as radical as it may be, those populations of vulnerable individuals are included in housing all people.”

During Friday’s meeting, interim KCRHA CEO Helen Howell read a statement apologizing for “any distress or discomfort caused by the incident” at the CoC Board meeting, “and we want to assure you that we take this matter seriously [and] are actively working to prevent such incidents from occurring in the future.”

In addition to replacing Colston and electing eight new board members, Continuum of Care members voted Friday to adopt a new charter for the board that relegates “lived experience” to just one of many qualifications for board seats and significantly reduces the board’s authority.

Homelessness Authority Attempts to Wrest Control Over Controversial, Consequential Oversight Board

By Erica C. Barnett

On Friday, the King County Regional Homelessness Authority will convene an unusual meeting to determine the future of a previously obscure body, the Continuum of Care Board, that made headlines earlier this year when its co-chair, Shanéé Colston, shouted down another board member who objected to the appointment of a registered sex offender to the board. That board member, who also described her own traumatic experience with the nominee, left the meeting after Colston and another board member told her she had no right to object.

The meeting includes a vote on a new charter for the organization as a whole, followed by a vote for new board members, including a replacement for Colston, who has not completed her three-year term.

In a statement on Wednesday, interim KCRHA CEO Helen Howell—said she hoped that “with new leadership in place, the CoC Board can refocus its energies on the upcoming application for over $50 million in federal funding to reduce and prevent homelessness across King County.”

The KCHRA’s leaders, Howell continued, “encourage the voting membership to consider the importance of electing a Board that will lead with empathy, build consensus, and focus first and foremost on our shared goal of bringing more people inside.” The statement was co-signed by the three chairs of the KCRHA’s governing board, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell, King County Executive Dow Constantine, and Renton City Councilmember representative Ed Prince.

For the past few weeks, the KCRHA has been encouraging people and organizations with a stake in the region’s homelessness system to sign up as members of the stakeholder group that oversees the region’s Continuum of Care (CoC), the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s term for an agency, like the KCRHA, that oversees and coordinates homelessness services in an area.

On Friday, this stakeholder group—now, thanks in part to the KCRHA’s recruitment efforts, about 150 strong—is scheduled to vote on a new charter for the Continuum of Care as a whole, as well as new members of the CoC board. The new charter, if it’s adopted, will empower the entire CoC membership, rather than the board itself, to determine who sits on the board—a significant change that would make board members uniquely accountable to a large group of unelected stakeholders.

After the charter vote, the CoC is scheduled to vote on 13 candidates for board seats, including five current members and eight new nominees. Colston is not running for reelection to the board. KCRHA spokesman Anne Martens said members of the board itself, including two co-chairs, requested the change. “This process is a best practice to keep the board accountable to the community,” Martens said.

The KCRHA—whose first director, Marc Dones, recently resigned—is in a period of retrenchment. Under Dones, the KCRHA committed to empower people with direct experience of homelessness as key decision makers at the authority—sometimes at the expense of more conventional qualifications, like work experience and technical expertise. Now, after a chaotic first two years, the agency is starting to walk some of those commitments back.

The Continuum of Care board has a complex mix of responsibilities: It reviews and approves the KCRHA’s applications for federal funding, oversees performance metrics for homeless service providers, and creates a prioritization tool to judge funding applications, among other duties.

After PubliCola broke the story, right-wing media grabbed it and took it in a predictable direction, demonizing Colston—a volunteer board member with extensive personal experience of homelessness—as an out-of-control “official” for the KCRHA and demanding her resignation.

However, the board is probably now best known for the meeting in which Colston shouted down another board member who objected to the appointment of a man who has been convicted of multiple sex offenses involving teenage girls and who, according to the board member, had also touched her inappropriately. After the incident, KCRHA chief program officer Peter Lynn asked Colston to resign, saying her actions had created a “hostile environment for KCRHA staff and committee members.” The board has not held a public meeting since May.

Although the nominee, Raven Crowfoot (also known as Thomas Whitaker), later withdrew his application, the fallout from the incident was immense. After PubliCola broke the story, right-wing media grabbed it and took it in a predictable direction, demonizing Colston—a volunteer board member with extensive personal experience of homelessness—as an out-of-control “official” at the KCRHA and demanding her resignation. Colston, who did not respond to a request for comment, did not step down. But she is not running for reelection to the board, which means that if the vote goes forward on Friday, she will be replaced before the end of her term.

According Martens, new CoC board members (and current members who choose to attend) “will receive an in-depth onboarding,” including “training on the Open Public Meetings Act, CoC roles and responsibilities, trauma-informed practices, LGBTQIA2S+ equity, professional development for people with lived experience, and board roles and responsibilities among other items.”

The proposed new charter also removes all references to the Lived Experience Coalition, an advocacy group that was empowered, under Dones, to directly appoint members to the agency’s implementation board and weigh in on agency policies and priorities. The new charter even deletes a reference to the LEC’s role in creating the agency’s theory of change, instead crediting the community and the National Innovation Service, the firm where Dones developed the framework for the KCRHA as a consultant.

As we reported last week, the KCRHA recently terminated an agreement that gave the LEC the authority to staff the KCRHA’s ombudsperson office, and has been systematically removing references to the organization from job descriptions, the KCRHA’s Five-Year Plan, and other agency documents. The KCRHA has been distancing itself from the LEC for a while, but a major breaking point came when the LEC and its fiscal agent, Building Changes, ran out of money to operate several hotel-based shelters it was operating with federal funds earlier this year.

It’s unclear who, specifically, drafted the new version of the charter, which is dated “June 2023.” Martens said it was developed “with input from current Board members and KCRHA staff, with guidance from HUD [Technical Assistance] and KCRHA counsel.” An earlier, much different version of the charter, which had been on the KCRHA’s website since at least the beginning of May, was posted ” in error before counsel had a chance to review,” according to Martens.

The KCRHA’s “Meet the Continuum of Care Board” web page no longer displays the names of the board (available here); instead, it reads, “CoC Board Members are being voted on at the June 23rd, 2023 CoC Member Convening. Results of the vote will be posted here June 26th, 2023.” A list of candidates is available on the KCRHA’s website.

Board Overseeing Federal Homelessness Funds Erupts Into Shouts Over Nomination of Sex Offender

By Erica C. Barnett

The King County Regional Homelessness Authority has asked a member of its Continuum of Care board to step down after she yelled at a fellow board member who objected to the appointment of a proposed new board member, pointing out that he is a registered sex offender and accusing him of behaving inappropriately toward her in the past.

In an email to KCRHA staff and board members last Thursday, KCRHA chief program officer Peter Lynn said he was formally asking the board co-chair, Shanéé Colston, to resign after she “shouted down committee member Kristina Sawyckyj for identifying that one of the prospective AC nominees was a registered sex offender, which is public information. Ms. Sawyckyj was also shouted down by Chair Colston when she spoke of her experience being inappropriately touched by the nominee.”

The continuum of care board plays an important role in securing homelessness funds from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development. It reviews and approves applications for federal funding, oversees annual funding renewal requests and performance metrics for homeless service providers, and creates a prioritization tool to judge funding applications.

During a flurry of overlapping shouts, another board member interjected that she had had “nothing but good experiences with [the nominee]” and told Sawyckvj she should contact the police, which Sawyckvj said she had. Sawyckyj went silent, and eventually left the meeting.

The argument began a little more than 45 minutes into the meeting (viewable on the board’s website, which contains a trigger warning for the meeting), when board member Kristina Sawyckyj objected to the appointment of a man who has been convicted for multiple sex offenses involving teenage girls.

In 2010, when he was 25, he was convicted of harboring a minor, a 13-year-old runaway with whom he had a sexual relationship, according to court records. Two years later, the nominee was charged with raping a minor in a case involving a 15-year-old girl; he ultimately pled guilty to communicating with a minor for immoral purposes, a felony sex crime. In 2018, Seattle police found him living in a tent near the Seattle waterfront with a 17-year-old girl, whose mother picked her up and took her home, according to Seattle court records.

Also on the agenda at the delayed meeting: An update to the charter for the Continuum of Care Board, which the board has proposed amending to specify that all 19 members must have lived experience of homelessness or housing instability.

“[He] is a sex offender, a repeat sex offender, and I have had [a] bad experience with him,” Sawyckyj said, adding that the nominee had “touched me” inappropriately in the past.

At that point, Colston cut her off, yelling, “we don’t do that here” and saying it was against board rules to “out” someone who was convicted of a sex crime. During a flurry of overlapping comments, another board member interjected that she had had “nothing but good experiences with [the nominee]” and told Sawyckvj she should contact the police, which Sawyckvj said she had.

Sawyckyj went silent, then left the meeting, while Colston continued. “I’m telling you that you cannot talk like that in this meeting. I will not have that here!” Colston said. “If anyone wants to talk like that you will be muted and removed from this meeting,” she said. “This is about equity. And everyone—everyone— deserves housing. I don’t care if they’re a sex offender! … This is an inclusive space, and we are equitable to all.”

The new board members were supposed to be confirmed during a special meeting last Friday, but the KCRHA canceled the meeting on Thursday. “This unacceptable behavior by leadership of the CoC Advisory Committee has created a hostile environment for KCRHA staff and committee members,” Lynn wrote in his email. “I will be working with KCRHA leadership and our attorneys to determine the next steps to ensure the safety of all those involved in the [board].

Also on the agenda at the delayed meeting: An update to the charter for the Continuum of Care Board, which the board has proposed amending to specify that all 19 members must have lived experience of homelessness or housing instability. The board, which is required by federal policy, predates the KCRHA. In its pre-KCRHA iterations, the board included elected officials, homeless and human service providers, and government staff, in addition to people with direct experience of homelessness.