If you had $216 million, what would you to do address homelessness?

KOMO reports the City of Seattle now has a record $216 million to spend on homelessness this year and with about 8,000 people unsheltered, the city should be poised to make a serious dent in the number of unsheltered and unserved people…right? Recent history does not suggest success.

Despite spending more than $100 million on homelessness last year, the number of people experiencing homelessness actually increased in Seattle. And the Council isn’t providing any specifics on how more than doubling their homelessness spending from a few years ago will turn out any different. In fact, according to Council president Lorena Gonzalez, they will actually need “up to $1 billion to build the shelter and housing that’s needed.”

Let’s be honest: even if they budgeted $1 billion for homelessness, the Council would still say it’s not enough.

Here’s why: if you produce a plan for what you actually need, when you’re plan falls short you can’t deflect by saying you didn’t have enough money.

So the strategy amounts to:

1. Don’t provide any specifics on how to solve homelessness.
2. Fail to solve homelessness.
3. Blame the lack of funding to solve homelessness.
4. Repeat.

Zero accountability and people continue to languish on our streets and in our parks.