As deadline nears for Ballard Nickelsville to move, new location is not ready

The Ballard Nickelsville camp on Market St. will officially reach the end of its two-year stay on November 18th. But in a meeting with neighbors and the camp’s residents last night, the City of Seattle said the new location — at 3814 4th Ave. NE in the Northlake neighborhood — will not be ready until mid-December.

With winter approaching, the city says Nickelsville is welcome to stay in Ballard until then. But camp residents say they’re concerned that they’d be breaking their promise with the community if they don’t move on the 18th, according to KOMO TV. Neighbors at the meeting said they didn’t mind if campers stayed a little longer.

Another issue is the size of the new location — a plot of land owned by City Light. While 20% larger, campers worry it may yield less usable space than Nickelsville’s current location in Ballard.

Earlier this summer, a city report found that the Nickesville encampments around Seattle have met or exceeded performance expectations. The Ballard location was the first city-permitted encampment, and it serves up to 25 residents at a time.

The city says it’s planning two community meetings on Nov. 16th and 20th to discuss the Northlake site. There’s an existing meeting already planned for Nov. 28 to discuss the Northlake site at 6:30 p.m., UW Fisheries Building — Auditorium 102, 1122 NE Boat Street (flyer here).

We’ll keep you updated.

Geeky Swedes

The founders of My Ballard

20 thoughts to “As deadline nears for Ballard Nickelsville to move, new location is not ready”

  1. 121 people housed out of 759.

    Only in government would an 84% failure rate “have met or exceeded performance expectations”.

    Why bury the lede?

  2. “Let us all in on your fix, Wendy. Go ahead, fill us in on your solution.”

    Nice to see you acknowledging coddling isn’t working.

  3. @Wendy:

    “121 people housed out of 759.

    Only in government would an 84% failure rate ‘have met or exceeded performance expectations’.”

    Only in some wacko, ignorant brain would going from 0% to 16%, after two years of a low cost experiment such as this, be considered a failure.

    But the all-knowing Wendy has spoken! Cancel the program and return to 0% transitioned. Maybe we should go back to harassing and jailing the homeless, like the good ol’ days? Nevermind that would cost way more than actually housing the homeless. But we can’t be seen as weak coddlers, now can we Wendy?

  4. Simple deduction, my dear Wendy:

    Before the program existed, the program transitioned 0% of people to permanent housing. After the program existed, the program transitioned >0% of people to permanent housing.

    Thus, if the program were to cease to exist, one could arrive at the assumption that the program would return to transitioning 0% of people to permanent housing. QED

    Look for my white paper on this hard to follow logic. And until then, keep clutching those pearls and wringing those hands!

  5. I don’t understand how you can not understand: if you cancel a program, that program will not be providing the intended function anymore, because the program doesn’t exist. There’s no facts, it’s simple logic.

  6. “I don’t understand how you can not understand: if you cancel a program, that program will not be providing the intended function anymore, because the program doesn’t exist.”

    Then you start a program that does work and doesn’t let folks simply be “happy campers” on the taxpayers dime, which is apparently what they prefer when only 16% accept housing.

  7. @Wendy: I get it, you “concerned” pearl-clutchers have high standards. You want a program that is 100% free, is 100% effective and is 100% out of sight, out of mind. But for some reason, you never seem to be able to share your groundbreaking ideas!

    Luckily, you extremely small, vocal minority are more and more getting ignored, as the sane residents of Seattle realize you can’t please impossible wishes AND actually solve problems.

  8. “100% effective”

    I’d take 50%. 16% is a joke.

    “vocal minority are more and more getting ignored”

    Which is why Jenny Durkan kicked Moon’s a$$ no doubt.

  9. @Wendy: Again, please tell us what your “immediate 50% success” plan is. Otherwise, the real world is going to continue trying various ideas to see what works and continue to develop a plan forward. It’s a homeless crisis with human beings, not an exercise to try methods of removing a stain from a shirt.

    Again, 16% is better than 0% from before. And considering the 0% success rate of ignoring the problem was causing a snowball effect in the homeless population, I’d consider this extremely low cost measure a success.

  10. “immediate 50% success”

    There isn’t, with people who don’t want to be housed.

    During sweeps in the Jungle only 15% accepted housing. The rest? Flapped away, many settling in Ballard.

    But keep pretending the homeless problem is one caused by “evil corporations”.

  11. @Wendy:

    “During sweeps in the Jungle only 15% accepted housing. The rest? Flapped away, many settling in Ballard.”

    There’s usually a reason they don’t want to move to shelters (read: not housing). If you talk to them sometime, they’ll gladly tell you. But I’m guessing you’re one of those people that walk to the other side of the street to avoid a homeless person, so that’ll never happen.

    Hardly anyone “wants” to live on the streets. It’s not fun, it’s not safe and it’s certainly not desirable. Until you go try to live one single night on the street, you’ll just get laughed at when you say people want to live on the streets.

    “But keep pretending the homeless problem is one caused by ‘evil corporations’.”

    Who is blaming “evil corporations”? I assume you’re pulling out some random non sequitur because you’ve ran out of arguments. It’s been fun! Welcome to the Northwest, btw!

  12. “There’s usually a reason they don’t want to move to shelters”

    Pillows aren’t soft enough?

    Apparently, beggars can be choosers in Seattle.

  13. @Wendy: And when they are rejected for whatever rules the shelter might have? Well, Wendy sez: tough it up snowflake! She didn’t move here and buy an $800,000 overpriced house, just to see homeless people!

  14. @Wendy: Instead of griping on a blog comment section and making a fool of yourself, because you clearly have no idea what you’re talking about, volunteer at a shelter or soup kitchen and talk to some of them. They’re humans after all, and most of them will share their story of why they’re on the streets, how difficult it is to get off the streets and why the shelters we have aren’t really much of a solution.

    But you won’t. You’d rather clutch your pearls and wring your hands until they’re raw.

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