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00000181-fa79-da89-a38d-fb7f2ae90001March 2015 marks the anniversary of a bold promise: King County's 10-year plan to end homelessness. The Committee To End Homelessness, which created the plan, has been working to revise its strategy now that the 10-year plan is ending and local homelessness is worse than ever.Talk of ending homelessness is being replaced with less-lofty aspirations: making homelessness rare and brief when it does occur.This series is a collaboration with InvestigateWest and is edited by KUOW's Carol Smith. Join the conversation on Twitter using #NoEndInSight.

Seattle Mayor's Office Chooses Possible Sites For Future Tent Cities

Homeless encampment along a road in the Sodo area of Seattle.
KUOW Photo/John Ryan
Homeless encampment along a road in the Sodo area of Seattle.

There could soon be new homeless camps in Seattle.

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray's administration has picked three sites and plans to send them to the City Council for review.

TRANSCRIPT

Earlier this year, Murray said he wanted three new places for future homeless camps and then called them a temporary fix

Murray: "Encampments are not an answer to solving homelessness, they are one tool in getting people into a somewhat safer situation. The real focus has to be on shelter. And it has to be moving people who have been in shelters for a very long time into permanent housing." 

Now officials are discussing where these three camps will go.

The Mayor's office has released a list and a map of locations in Ballard, Interbay and the industrial area south of Sodo. The locations are all on city-owned land and are not in residential areas.

The new camps would be operated by groups that have experience running tent cities.

Officials have also selected four other locations for potential camps, and that list includes sites in Crown Hill, Wallingford, West Seattle and Rainier Valley.

This year's one night count of homeless people in King County found a 20 percent increase over last year.

The City Council will need to approve of the new homeless camp plan. 

Year started with KUOW: 1998.