Press Room

Most of Anchorage might be ready to try a new way to fight chronic homelessness but the people who live and work in Fairview are raw from years of dealing with street people. They're leery of a new homeless housing project proposed there. I don't blame them.

For decades, Fairview has been living with homeless -- drunk, high, mentally ill, head-injured and all of the above -- staggering down their streets, scaring their kids, peeing in their parking lots and sleeping in their doorways.

So it's been a tough sell for the Rural Alaska Community Action Program's Karluk Manor, which would be located in what's now the Red Roof Inn on Fifth Avenue. It would be the city's first large-scale "housing first" program, modeled after a project in Seattle called 1811 Eastlake.

The program would target 48 of the worst cases among the homeless--the chronic alcoholics who end up at the jail, the sleep-off center and the emergency room more than anyone else. But the basic premise -- putting them in housing without requiring them to quit drinking -- makes the neighbors suspicious. They are cynical that another social service program will just draw more glassy-eyed faces to their street corners.

But here's the thing: housing first has succeeded where the status quo has failed. And last year, keeping with the status quo for homeless in Anchorage was deadly. Fourteen homeless people died in city parks, streets and homeless camps .

Housing first isn't going to be a cure for all our city's problems with alcohol. And it's not rehab for the people who live there. But studies show when you take chronic alcoholics off the streets, they drink less, and that means fewer visits to emergency rooms, the sleep-off center and jail. That saves a lot of public money. That also means some of the worst cases aren't out there panhandling and freezing to death in the homeless camps.

The manor would keep strict control of overnight guests. Residents would pay rent. Loitering and panhandling outside the building would be forbidden. There would be daily supervision and access to health care and other social services. But this is a fringe population, mired in addiction and blighted with health problems that come from living on the street. Cops and paramedics would still show up at the manor. Some of the residents will die. And there's no way to guarantee that residents or their associates will never cause problems for the neighbors.

Fairview may not be an ideal testing ground. For better or worse, the main reason for the proposed location is that the Red Roof Inn offered RurAL CAP the building at a deep discount, making the program possible. Busy streets run on both sides of the building. And businesses nearby already have trouble with street people. But, then, is any neighborhood in town going to welcome housing for chronic alcoholics?

I called Seattle, where hundreds of housing-first units are now run by several nonprofits, including 1811 Eastlake. I talked to Kate Joncas, president of the Downtown Seattle Association, which represents businesses downtown. The city did two things that made a difference with the chronically homeless, she said. It put tougher restrictions on alcohol sellers and it opened housing-first projects.

At first, some objected to the idea of sheltering homeless without requiring sobriety on moral grounds. Others were afraid the projects would attract more homeless and more drunk people would be coming in and out of the buildings. But that didn't happen, she said: Business owners saw fewer people sleeping on the streets and calls to the sleep-off center went down.

"When you go and pick up the 75 people who are the ones who show up most (in jails, ERs and sleep-off centers), that makes a big difference in your downtown," she said. Realistically, a lot of chronic alcoholics aren't going to get sober, she said.

"(Housing first) was more effective than what we were doing and cost less," she said. "As a business group, what was not to like?"

But there are critics, including Robb Anderson, who owns a trophy shop next door to 1811 Eastlake. He has never been a fan of the project. He told me he has more problems with the homeless than he used to and it's messing with his business. Joncas said other businesses nearby don't have complaints.

The people of Fairview want to know that the project will have enough staff to meet the needs of the residents. They worry about pedestrian accidents. They want to be assured that residents and friends of residents aren't going to cause problems. These kinds of questions make sense.

I was impressed by Heidi Heinrich, a general manager at the Lucky Wishbone, the iconic Fairview lunch and dinner counter. Her business is leery of the project moving in across the street. She thinks if there are problems with residents or their friends, her business is most at risk. And it doesn't seem fair to her that hard-working people should have to put up with the bad behavior of chronic alcoholics.

But, she told me, the Lucky Wishbone is going to keep talking with RurAL CAP. Some of the restaurant's managers are even going to go to Seattle to look at 1811 Eastlake. If Karluk Manor is going in across the street, they want to come up with ways to make it work for them.

The Karluk Manor plan isn't perfect. But maybe getting 48 of the city's 300 or so most serious inebriates off the street might put a dent in the problems that plague the neighborhood. Maybe it will keep some of them from ending up dead. Or maybe, like a lot of complex problems without easy solutions, it won't be that clear-cut.

But if 14 people dead last year tells you anything, it's that now is the time to try something new.

So far, this is the best idea we have.