Car dwellers Arnold and Carol Hampton get a home. ‘All the stars aligned ... for them’
Arnold and Carol Hampton were living in their Ford Fiesta last month when The Olympian profiled them as a way to bring to life the challenges of a distinct subset of people without housing in Thurston County: those who live in their cars.
That story also dug into one possible solution to help them: providing safe parking lots with access to some indoor facilities, as churches in Seattle have been doing for a decade.
There are at least 195 people living in cars in Thurston County – and likely more, since that only includes those surveyed, according to preliminary data from the 2020 Point-in-Time count.
But the Hamptons’ personal story resonated with readers who shared the story with others. A few weeks after that article was published, two things happened:
One: the Washington State Park Rangers Association organized a GoFundMe for the Hamptons, which has raised $4,805.
Two: Around the same time, a City of Lacey outreach worker drove to the dialysis clinic parking lot where Carol gets treatment and handed the Hamptons a housing application.
Moving up the list
Arnold didn’t think much of it at first. He had filled out so many applications already, and had previously applied for a Section 8 voucher but been denied.
Yet one week later, the Hamptons got a call saying they were accepted to a subsidized unit at Evergreen Vista, an apartment complex on the Westside operated by the nonprofit Mercy Housing.
The apartment is a rare find – one of 10 “project-based voucher” units reserved for homeless families and filled through a process separate from both coordinated entry and the Housing Authority of Thurston County’s (HATC) numerous waiting lists, according to property manager Kat Davis.
“Project-based” units are subsidized through the Housing Authority and function similarly to Section 8, where tenants pay 30% of their income. But instead of a voucher that can be used anywhere, it’s tied to this particular unit.
Davis explained that on the rare occasion a unit opens up, the Housing Authority sends her a batch of about ten applicants from their waitlist. Davis interviews them to determine if they meet certain qualifications. In this case, none of the applicants were currently homeless, a requirement for this particular unit.
Normally Davis would continue going through the waitlist until finding a homeless family. But according to HATC Rental Assistance Program Director Karen McVea, no one on their waitlist currently identifies as homeless. (McVea says the HATC will soon be sending out a survey to people on the waitlist to gather that information.)
That opened up a chance for the Community Action Council to proactively recommend someone for the open unit.
“I think there’s a gray area if you go through the applicants and you don’t have someone,” Davis said. “It’s so seldom that we have an opening in our project-based units.”
Basically, the Hamptons just got lucky.
“All the stars aligned at the same time for them,” Davis said.
Rangers respond
Dwight Keegan is a retired Park Ranger and the Director of the Retired Rangers group within the Washington State Park Rangers’ Association, an organization of about 200 state park employees of past and present.
Keegan says that after The Olympian’s article about the Hamptons came out, he started getting messages from multiple retired rangers who wanted to help. Some had begun sending money to the Hamptons directly.
On August 5th, Keegan created a GoFundMe entitled “Arnold Hampton, Homelessness is real,” which has raised $4,805.
“What you’re seeing is a lot of retired folks that are responding,” said Keegan. “There’s a certain amount of pent up need to reach out to one another and be part of something.”
While he met Arnold only a handful of times at trainings, Keegan feels strongly that rangers should take care of their own. He was also moved by the belief that a crucial part of being a state parks employee is the promise of being financially secure in retirement.
“The one thing I could always count on with parks was the security that I had a job, and if I did my job and behaved myself, that job would be there for as long as I wanted to work it, and I’d have the money to care for myself in the future and my retirement, too,” Keegan said. “And here’s one just based on circumstances – and Arnold’s care for his wife – that he wasn’t able to do that.”
Their new apartment
The Hamptons moved in on Saturday, August 15.
Sitting in his new apartment, Arnold told The Olympian how surprised he was at how fast help had materialized.
“I was at a point for a while there where I was like, we’re probably just gonna be here for another two years, whatever,” Arnold said. “Either suffering through the heat or suffering through the cold, we’ve just gotta get prepared for that. There was no way in my mind I thought we’d be sitting in this house.”
The biggest changes are the obvious ones – having a bed and a bathroom, some space, some privacy. They’re both sleeping much better than before.
When they were in their car, the traffic noise kept them awake until around 2 A.M. Now Carol says she sleeps “like a log.”
Carol told me she also has space to stretch and get out of her wheelchair. Sometimes she uses her walker, but more often prefers leaning on her husband for support.
“Walking with him is a lot more fun. And when you’re blind and you’re not able to do things like you used to, you find every chunk of fun you can have.”
Inside the apartment, Arnold unpacked some boxes with donated items. There’s some furniture, a two-seat recliner and a queen bed, that was brought by the friend whose driveway the Hamptons once parked their RV in.
Arnold remarked on the simple ability to make coffee at home, a huge revelation. And now that they have a way to keep food cold, he’s excited to start cooking more and cut out “crap food”.
Recently they bought a Costco membership.
“I think at first what we’re gonna do is just take time and relax, get our minds clear and just say, hey, let’s take a breath.”
One couple helped, but many are not
This is a story about one family who got the help they needed. The Hamptons were initially profiled because they illustrated a particular set of issues -- and because they were generous and patient enough to share their story with The Olympian and its readers.
But their case is an aberration. Many people in the Hamptons’ position remain unhoused and struggling because they have not been featured in a news article.
For seniors like Carol, with a monthly income of $804 from Supplemental Security (SSI), there are very few housing options in Thurston County.
An affordable rent for someone on SSI is $247 per month, a recent report by the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance (WLIHA) found. In Thurston County, the average one-bedroom apartment rents for $1,124, according to the Thurston Regional Planning Council.
And as the Point in Time count shows, more than 195 people in Thurston County continue to live in their cars.
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