Asylee Encampment at RPUMC

SITUATION SUMMARY

Beginning in 2023, hundreds of asylum-seekers have passed through an encampment site owned and managed by the Riverton Park United Methodist Church (RPUMC) in Tukwila. Most of the residents are fleeing violence and conflict in their homelands. Unfortunately, the site continues to be beyond capacity and with inadequate housing, putting vulnerable people at risk.

Tukwila is a welcoming community, and we want all people in our city to be safe, whether they are in long-time homes or in emergency shelters. The City works with service providers to ensure the highest level of fire, life and safety standards are met. We also want all asylum seekers to stabilize and transition to effective re-housing and supportive service programs as quickly as possible.

For more than a year, the City has provided support to RPUMC with onsite staff assistance, site design, access control strategies, contractors, and direct services, such as a large temporary sheltering tent, garbage services and heating and cooling mechanisms.

Tukwila is proud to be part of the solution, but we can’t be the only solution. This is a state and regional crisis, and Tukwila has 22,000 people in a metro region of 4,000,000. We have received support from the State of Washington and King County, and we will continue to work with them to respond to this situation and to develop sustainable, regional models that balance the work across multiple qualified agencies.

LATEST UPDATES

10/8/24 – The number of people living onsite at the church individuals and families are gradually being moved into more supportive housing and improved record-keeping and monitoring is stabilizing the population.

There are no small tents on the property and no one is living in the cinder-block garage, which has previously been identified as a life-safety hazard. There are ongoing fire code violations on the site, as there has been for more than a year, and the City continues to work with RPUMC to make sure asylum seekers are safe.

The City was provided $2.5 million in the State budget; $2 million is to provide housing for asylum seekers, and up to $500K can be used by the City to reimburse some of our costs from July 1 onwards. The housing funds are not only for RPUMC, as the City also has asylum seekers that RPUMC placed at the Econolodge in Tukwila. The Econolodge is operated by Access To Our Community (ATOC), which has been housing asylum seekers since May without any financial support. ATOC is a nonprofit connected to the Abubakr Islamic Center of WA in Tukwila. The City has provided ATOC with $100,000 to help them with housing services and another $50K contract is currently in the works.

It is our priority to help asylum seekers connect to services and be a supportive partner in the statewide response. Tukwila is actively engaging with agencies providing services to asylum seekers for strategic funding considerations.

WHAT’S NEXT

Throughout the summer of 2024, City staff have been meeting several times a week with RPUMC leadership to address safety issues onsite. Experts from the fire department and other city departments regularly visit the site, document progress and continued safety shortcomings, and make recommendations. That level of monitoring is expected to continue until permanent improvements are made to both the site and the program.

We will continue to ensure Tukwila’s service providers are providing high levels of safety and working with county and state response agencies as well. Meeting basic safety standards and formalizing service programs is also important to qualifying for larger systems of care and financial support, which the City supports.

The City has received financial support from the State of Washington and King County in responding to the ongoing needs of asylum seekers, including assisting with locating housing.  The City will decommission the white tent by the end of October. It’s important to remember that the City has been provided limited funds and there are not sufficient funds to address all the needs in the community. The City is hopeful that the State system, which is currently in the process of being set up, will be better able to address the needs of asylum seekers.

BACKGROUND

Beginning in 2023, hundreds of people have passed through an encampment site owned and managed by the Riverton Park United Methodist Church (RPUMC) in Tukwila. Most of the residents were asylum-seekers fleeing violence and conflict in their homeland. The site continued to be a health and safety hazard to an estimated 400 people still living on the site in late 2023.

RPUMC is in a residential neighborhood and with dozens of tents onsite, it qualified as a humanitarian crisis. The City proclaimed a state of emergency and began providing both resources and staff time to make the people living at RPUMC safe. Since that time, the City has worked to resolve life-safety dangers, lent a tent, secured state funds, and connected organizers with regional partners.

Given the increasing number of asylees and potential impacts to neighboring cities, Tukwila is committed to finding a more sustainable and effective regional solution.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

Many members of the community have reached out directly to city staff offering to help. For smaller donations (blankets, supplies, food, etc.) or offers to assist please contact RPUMC directly at JCIJ.NW@gmail.com.

For large-scale donations or housing proposals, please forward the inquiry to the Director of Government Relations and Strategic Initiatives, Brandon Miles, at Brandon.Miles@Tukwilawa.gov.

NEWS

State announces where $16.4 million in asylum-seeker aid will go – Seattle Times, July 25, 2024

Asylum-seekers in Kent face intense heat as volunteers work to secure housing – KOMO, July 10, 2024

For migrants on way to Seattle, border shelters serve as temporary stop – Seattle Times, June 26, 2024

Migrants flee suffering, endure jungle to seek asylum in Seattle – Seattle Times, June 23, 2024