The Navigation Center shelter in the Pearl Warren Building at 12th and Weller Street in Little Saigon is closing at the end of March, two months later than the original deadline of January announced last year.
Downtown Emergency Service Center (DESC), which operates the Navigation Center, is waiting for its new Stability Through Access and Resources (STAR) Center to opens at 3rd Avenue and Cherry Street in downtown Seattle so that the remaining guests at the Navigation Center have a place to move to, according to Jessica Schreindl, spokesperson for DESC, in an email to the International Examiner.
The Navigation Center’s staff will transition to working at the new STAR Center, Schreindl said. DESC is working on moving clients at the Navigation Center into permanent housing. “Clients who have not yet acquired housing will move to the STAR Center,” according to Schreindl.
The STAR Center will fulfill a similar need as the Navigation Center, according to Schreindl, serving unsheltered adults living with severe and persistent psychiatric conditions and substance use disorders.
Referrals to the STAR Center will come from DESC’s Opioid Recovery & Care Access (ORCA) Center, Mobile Rapid Response Crisis Team (MRRCT), and Homeless Outreach Stabilization and Transition (HOST) program, as well as the City of Seattle’s CARE team, Health One program, REACH, and other first responders and outreach teams, Schreindl said.
The Navigation Center’s planned departure from the neighborhood was announced by Deputy Mayor Greg Wong during a meeting of the CID Public Safety Council Meeting on March 5 last year.
Based on a low-barrier shelter model in San Francisco, Seattle’s Navigation Center focuses on helping homeless adults living in encampments with significant behavioral health issues get back on their feet, offering on-site hygiene facilities, 24/7 staffing, and intensive case management.
It has also been controversial in Little Saigon ever since it was placed there in 2017, when community stakeholders felt it was sited in the neighborhood with a lack of consultation or mitigation.
But according to DESC and Mayor Harrell’s office, the shelter’s closure is not due to community feedback. Last year, they told the International Examiner that the shelter is leaving because its stay was always meant to be temporary, and the building (which is owned by the Seattle Indian Services Commission) needs repairs and renovations.
