Area mosques confront growing pains

On Friday afternoons, prayers at SeaTac Mosque attract so many people that the women in one building are lined wall to wall, some standing outside. The men pray in large canvas tents in the backyard.

It's not unusual these days to find that area mosques are no longer big enough to accommodate the growth in the number of local Muslims.

And in the next few weeks, the mosques will be particularly full as Muslims observe the holy month of Ramadan, which begins this week. During Ramadan, which commemorates the seventh-century revelation of the Quran to the Prophet Muhammad, Muslims abstain from food, drink and sensual pleasures from sunrise to sunset to focus on their relationship with God and on how it feels to be poor, hungry or sick.

"Usually more people come during the month of Ramadan than the rest of the year," said Imam Raed Alsawaier of SeaTac Mosque. The mosque's crowded conditions have come to the attention of the city of SeaTac, which says it's in violation of several city codes.

Estimates of the number of Muslims in the Puget Sound area vary widely. A figure frequently cited in the past has been about 40,000 to 50,000. But now, some community leaders place the number at about 60,000 to 75,000.

Hisham Farajallah, president of the Islamic Center of Washington, which runs Idriss Mosque at Northgate, remembers when a rented school gym was large enough to accommodate the communitywide Eid al-Fitr celebration marking the end of Ramadan. Nowadays, the celebration is held in places like Seattle Center, the Washington State Convention & Trade Center or Qwest Field.

There's been steady growth over the last 15 years, Farajallah says. He noticed a spike around 1993, with Muslims of Asian and Middle Eastern heritage coming here from other states.

Alsawaier said the big jump came around 2000 with the influx of Somalis, many of whom lived or worked nearby.

When the Muslim Association of Puget Sound, a Redmond-based group, was formed about a year and a half ago, about 50 to 100 people attended Friday afternoon prayers at its rented office-park facility, said president Hyder Ali. Now, about 250 people show up.

This month, the group is renting adjoining space to accommodate more people during Ramadan.

Perhaps nowhere is the growth more apparent than at SeaTac Mosque, which has been crowded for years. The mosque, which leaders say is Seattle's oldest, was established in the 1970s.

It's not unusual for 600 to 800 people to show up for Friday afternoon prayers — the busiest time for most mosques.

The city of SeaTac says the mosque has been "over capacity for many years," according to SeaTac City Manager Craig Ward. Ward says the mosque doesn't have enough restrooms and that its temporary-use permits for the canvas tents have expired.

He also says a new plan needs to be worked out for parking, now that the city has bought elementary-school property the mosque had been using as a parking lot.

The city and mosque leaders say they are working together to try to address those problems, and to negotiate a time frame. The city suggested six months; the mosque is hoping for three years.

Alsawaier said he also expects that a plan by members of Abu Bakr Mosque in Rainier Valley to establish a mosque in Tukwila will "relieve a lot of pressure from this mosque."

Over the years, Alsawaier said, the mosque has tried to address some of the problems by, for instance, having volunteers on Fridays put up traffic cones to make sure neighbors' driveways and mailboxes aren't blocked.

"We have never denied we have issues," Alsawaier said. The building "was designed for few people and we were flooded with a lot of people."