EP012: Inside view of Tent City 3
Transcript Available Here
Episode 12: Inside view of Tent City 3
There is a wide diversity of people who make up the population of Tent City 3. For every person living there you will find a profound reason for why this is their best choice for now. For some folks the stay is short, others stay longer to work things out while having shelter from the storm. Others arrive and discover their mission in life. Turning their experiences from hindrances into assets.
For folks who don't know, Tent City 3 is operated by the 501C(3) non profit called SHARE / WHEEL which stands for Seattle Housing and Resource Effort and its partner organization Women's Housing Equality and Enhancement League. Both organizations have deep roots in Seattle with their birth during the 1990 Goodwill games.
The self managed community model that SHARE/WHEEL developed in the 1990’s is one of the first in the country. From the beginning, Tent City 3 has moved quarterly to different host locations throughout the city, mostly to church parking lots.
In early January, for this episode, I spent two days and one night at Tent City 3. They were located on a small parking lot between the Husky stadium and lake Washington on the UW campus.
While I got to know a number of residents during the time there, such as Kendra, Osh, Andrew, Ryan, Sebastian, Rebekah, and others, most of my time was spent hanging out with Sean Smith.
Sean is one of the camp leaders who has years of experience operating tent cities and his time with SHARE goes back really to the beginning of the organization. We started our conversation with his childhood memories.
Sean Smith at TC3, January 2023
Andrew and Sean in the “office” tent
What's going on here that makes this place special?
”The family that I got to pick. When you're born into a family or you're adopted into a family, you don't pick that family. They, they, honestly they, they are supposed to pick you. You're born, your parents kept you, you're they picked you, you you're adopted, they picked you, but everybody that's here and some sort of way I've got to pick them as family and I know this isn't a journey like everybody stays here forever. Eventually I'll be moving on to but the people no matter what state they are, I know I can 100% trust them. I know that they have my back. They know I have their backs. I know that I can freely cry about something without ever feeling like fingers are being pointed at me and my my feelings are being laughed at. I'm safe. And there's a community here
A lot of us has been getting more into like actual city politics and stuff I've been to I think it's two or three rallies now about stopping the sweeps and wire sweeps are so harmful. I was talking to somebody who got swept in there like I lost my birth certificate, I lost everything. They refused to let us go and get it. And then I like to always put in the quote that I feel like people really need to stop fighting homelessness and start fighting poverty, more housing, or things like that. It's not being homeless. That's the issue. It's poverty of it. Yeah. I'm currently homeless because I was laid off. I can go get a job. I can probably go now and save up get housing, but I'm not ready to go back to work it and I know I'm not ready to leave the people here. There are people here who cannot do what I can do.” - Kendra
Kendra at TC3 in January 2023
Rex next to his overnight tent at TC3
TC3 located next to Husky Stadium in January 2023