Bellevue Council approves 10-year deal on homeless camps

The Bellevue City Council approved an agreement Monday that regulates homeless camps in the city for the next decade, allowing them to stay longer and effectively house more people.

The 5-2 vote also was one of the last chapters in a contentious, yearlong public debate over how the city should regulate the camps. Council chambers were packed Monday with opponents and supporters of Tent City 4, which moved to the city for the first time in November.

Mayor Grant Degginger said the agreement "shows we've raised the bar substantially" for how neighbors and homeless-camp residents are protected.

Some neighbors of Tent City 4 said the agreement made too many concessions to camp supporters, such as loosening the requirements on the number of toilets and showers.

The agreement still must be approved by a federal judge this week. The council approved strict regulations in July, but just days before Tent City 4 moved to Temple B'nai Torah last fall, the temple and Seattle Housing and Resource Effort (SHARE), which runs the camp, sued the city of Bellevue. They claimed some of the city's regulations violated the temple's religious freedoms.

The Church Council of Greater Seattle later joined the case in support of the temple.

The parties agreed on a tentative settlement — in the form of a consent decree — Jan. 12 after a private mediation session that stretched into the early-morning hours. But the City Council still had to sign off on the deal.

Before the agreement, the city had said the camp could stay for only 60 days, and because the temple was not providing enough toilets and showers, it could host just 40 people. The temple wanted to host the camp for 90 days with as many as 100 people, as in the camp's stays in other Eastside cities.

Under the decree, any homeless camp can stay as long as 90 days if hosts make a "bona-fide and sincere" statement that the 60-day limit would violate their religious freedom.

The toilet and shower requirements will be loosened enough that homeless camps will find it much easier to house as many as 100 people, though Tent City 4 usually has no more than 80.

Ashley Bach: 206-464-2567 or abach@seattletimes.com