After spending a week at St. Andrews Episcopal Church, Nickelsville is moving to Wallingford.
(The following post originally appeared on Wallingford’s neighborhood blog Wallyhood.)
Nickelsville, the controversial homeless encampment that was recently decamped from the Seattle Port, will be settling down, at least temporarily, in Wallingford. Scott Morrow, the band’s leader, posted this note to the Nickelsville Alerts mailing list (emphasis added):
As you know we were swept on Wednesday the 30th from the port of Seattle’s T-107 Park. It was shocking and shattering. Most of us have been separated from everything we own, except what will fill a backpack or two.
Since then many of us have been at St. Andrews Episcopal Church on 80th Ave NW. Many more, though, are floating between other places – temporarily couch surfing, sleeping in vehicles, staying in the jungle. A sizable number fled to Motels on Aurora. There are some ideas to try and have a project there. That’s not Nickelsville’s goal, but we wish them luck.
Many of the Nickelodeons who were swept last Wednesday will not be able to get back together until we have another outdoor site. This, and our inability to get our things back until we have an outdoor site, are two reasons why it is so important someone – most likely a church – stand up and let us stay for up to 3 months while we secure the permanent site.
On this Wednesday, the 7th, our core group of Nickelodeons will be moving to Keystone Congregational Church at 5019 Keystone Place North (& 50th in Wallingford.) It is a small building with a bighearted congregation. They are willing to share with us all they have, which is very moving to us.
We will be staying in their Sanctuary, and it is not yet clear how we will cook. It is not likely that more than 30 people can fit into the space. Because two Congregations use the space on Sundays we will have to be out from 8 AM to 7:30 PM on that day.
We would love to see you and visit, but must ask that you be careful in the donations that are dropped by – there isn’t much storage room.
At the same time, we have a big quandary. All of our belongings have either been seized by the Port, or are in one storage group with friends. In both cases, we cannot recover and take responsibility for them until there is an outdoor site with storage.
That means some of the clothes on our back have been the same clothes on the same back for a couple of days. We need to get some new clothes, and replace some of the other possessions we can’t yet retrieve.
If you have the following specific item their donation would be very helpful. If it’s not on this list, please call either the camp number – 450-5268 – or the Staff number – 450-9136. Then we can tell you whether to bring it now, or to wait until later.
Here is what we are in need of right now: Winter coats, blankets, sleeping bags. Men’s pants, sizes 34 to 36 shirts, women’s size 7 – 18, large to ex large sweatshirts, and also hygiene such as toothpaste, toothbrushes, soap, shampoo, towels, and deodorant.
Ready to eat food for about 30, tents and most of all money to pay for past and future porta potties and dumpsters are also needed. [...]
Please remember, folks, as you leave comments on this one: this is a very complex issue on which reasonable people may disagree. On the one hand, there’s a group of homeless people struggling to survive and to make some space for themselves in a world that has not been kind to them. On the other, I’m sure there are some people who have worked hard to carve a peaceful and beautiful place for themselves out of this city to call home, and they may look with fear and even disgust on the prospect of encroachment by a bedraggled mass.
The comments on the Yelp site for Nickelsville reflect the lack of open-mindedness on both sides I hope we avoid here. There, people sneer at each other (”You poor elites :( having to actually see the poor you ignore”) and at the homeless (”in a few more weeks when the leaves fall I will be left to stare at this shanty town from my dining room window”).
I’m sure we can have a more constructive conversation here.
