Seattle City Council moves to expand homeless shelter site sizes

A Seattle City Council committee voted Wednesday to expand the allowed size of temporary shelter sites by 50%, advancing a major priority for Mayor Katie Wilson as she seeks to stand up 4,000 new emergency beds by the end of her term.

The bill, which will go to the full council later this month, allows any location hosting tiny homes, vehicles or other forms of temporary shelter to grow to 150 residents, up from the previous cap of 100. It also allows one site to house 250 people.

The locations can't just be tents; to host more than 100 beds, at least half must be in "micro-modular structures" such as tiny homes.

The bill is one of three related to shelter expansion proposed by Wilson, marking the first major legislative swing by a mayor now five months into her tenure.

The first two passed last month. One set aside $8 million in spending to set up and run 500 shelter beds this year, on top of about $9 million tapped by the mayor's office that does not need council approval.

The second gave the city new authority to sign leases for larger pieces of land at market rates, lifting a previous limitation on the size and cost of real estate secured directly by the city.

The final bill taken up this week by the council seeks to take advantage of what the mayor's office believes is underused capacity in existing sites. There are currently more than 600 beds in 15 tiny home villages in the city. With the new legislation, that number could grow to 1,139 in just those sites. Camp Second Chance, in Southwest Seattle, could grow from 69 beds today to 250, staff concluded.

More than the first two bills, the shelter bed expansion gets at the heart of what could make Wilson's ambitious goal challenging. Though the council is unanimously supportive of the intent to bring new shelter online, members have voiced concern about how those places would be governed and how they'd interact with neighboring communities.

"I believe that we have a responsibility to ensure that the rollout of this expansion is well planned and has clear communication with the public," said Councilmember Dionne Foster. "I believe that we have a responsibility to ensure that our shelter locations are well staffed."

Members passed four amendments Wednesday.

One requires sites with more than 100 beds to have a public safety plan and form a committee to advise on its implementation.

Another requires the shelter locations enter agreements with nearby neighborhoods, laying out expectations for behavior and communication.

A third requires sites with more than 100 beds be staffed 24 hours a day.

The final one mandates a 1-to-15 ratio of case managers to residents with high needs.

Members briefly considered creating "buffer zones" between sites and nearby schools. Councilmember Maritza Rivera, who wrote the proposal, said she supports establishing emergency shelter but feared what sort of activity they might attract.

"A high-acuity shelter next to a school seems to be ripe for some conflict to be happening," she said in an interview. "Not because of the people living there but because drug dealers come to offer drugs to the people who have addiction issues."

Other members, though, were concerned the zones would overly limit where future sites could be placed.

"We need to be careful about how prescriptive we are," Councilmember Eddie Lin said in a media availability earlier in the week, to avoid making it "impossible for the mayor's office to implement it."

Rivera ultimately withdrew the amendment, largely because it likely did not comply with a new state law requiring cities to allow more shelter in all neighborhoods. She said she's now reworking the amendment to align with state law and require a notice to the schools.

The suite of bills from Wilson has tested, at times, her relationship with the council. Members have questioned her office's long-term plan for shelter and sought guarantees that they will be included in their establishment.

On a process level, council President Joy Hollingsworth publicly nudged the mayor's office over a "lack of communication" around these bills, particularly as it relates to the council's proposed amendments. Members have at times chafed, publicly and privately, at the feeling they're not being respected as a coequal branch of government by the mayor's office.

"The communication will continue to improve between council and the mayor's office," she said.

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This story was originally published May 6, 2026 at 4:48 PM.