Sobriety won't be rule at new shelter

The police radio crackles with Seattle's alcoholic trouble spots: A man is curled up in a fetal position in the bushes. Four drunken men need a pick-up at First Avenue and Pike Street. Two calls come from Occidental Park.

Three stops later, the emergency pick-up van pulls into a sobering center with eight groggy, half-lucid alcoholics, who will spend the next 10 to 14 hours sobering up on green plastic mats.


	Russ Rae and Mitch Mathers pick up a group of intoxicated men on Pike Street in Seattle. Men such as these are likely candidates for a new wet house. Gilbert W. Arias / Seattle Post-Intelligencer Click for larger photo

Unless they elect treatment, or decide to go "dry," many won't get access to homeless shelters or other housing and will return to the streets or the sobering center for another night.

But one social service agency thinks it's time to reconsider that "dry" rule.

This summer, the Downtown Emergency Service Center plans to build an unusual and controversial $8.6 million pre-recovery center, a so-called "wet house." While most shelters and housing projects in the city won't admit clients who are under the influence of alcohol or drugs, the new center won't require tenants to kick the drinking habit before bunking down in its 75 studio apartments.

The housing is meant for the chronic alcoholics who live out their addictions in the city's public spaces, and who, night after night, cycle through the sobering center, the emergency rooms and jails.

Financed with federal, state, county and city dollars, the center is the latest project stemming from a major initiative launched by King County in 1988 to help the county's estimated 1,000 chronic public inebriates.

That county initiative included a voluntary ban on sales of cheap booze in problem areas. Earlier this month, Mayor Greg Nickels asked the state Liquor Control Board to make the ban mandatory in Pioneer Square.

The goal of the new "wet" center is to get chronic drinkers off the streets and away from harm, and to reduce the enormous public resources they use up in jail and emergency rooms, said Bill Hobson, executive director of the Downtown Emergency Service Center.

Once the alcoholics are housed, fed and taken care of medically, case workers will develop trust with them and try to "encourage, cajole, coax" them into treatment, Hobson said.

"We can't ignore this population and watch them slowly die on the streets," he said.

Tenants can live for two years at the 75-studio facility, to be located at 1811 Eastlake Ave. in the Denny Triangle neighborhood.

They'll have access to counseling, daily meals and laundry facilities. A registered nurse, three chemical dependency specialists and around-the-clock staff members will watch over them.

But not everyone is pleased with the wet house concept because it tolerates addiction and doesn't require total abstinence. Rather, it seeks to lessen problems such as crime and public health dangers.


	At the Dutch Shisler Sobering Support Center in Seattle, Daniel Cohen, left, Casey Aurrell, center, and Bill Craig check the vital signs of an inebriated man who walked into the center on his own. Gilbert W. Arias / Seattle Post-Intelligencer Click for larger photo

Critics of this harm-reduction theory believe it enables people to continue to drink.

Others worry about its location in a potentially booming office, retail and residential neighborhood. Some neighbors have raised concerns about safety.

"Social services are important, but social services without purpose are difficult," said Joseph Alhadeff, an executive with the Benaroya Co., which owns three office complexes within blocks of the new project.

"They are a good social services agency, but this kind of a facility doesn't make good neighbors. It is counterproductive to providing a safe environment for neighbors."

Last year, YouthCare bought a site next to the planned new housing center for its Orion Center, which offers programs for homeless teens. But the agency decided last month to sell it, not wanting to move its teenagers next to chronic alcoholics.

"We serve kids, adolescents. It's a high-risk population, and we just don't think it's the best mix," said Victoria Wagner, YouthCare's chief executive.

The emergency center's Hobson acknowledged chances are remote that these chronic drinkers would completely abstain from alcohol or drugs. But he said that if they're in housing, they'll have a better chance of abstinence than if they're outside, getting arrested or harming themselves or the community.

"It's much cheaper to have them in housing than in jails or in the emergency rooms," said Patrick Vanzo, a manager with the King County Department of Community and Human Services.

In 2000, he said, the county's top 20 resource users cost at least $1 million in sobering center admissions, jail days, detoxification treatment and emergency room services.

The most likely candidates for the new center are the chronic alcoholics that Russ Rae and Mitch Mathers pick up while operating their white Emergency Services Patrol van.

The van runs around the clock, covering most of the city, although downtown and Capitol Hill get most of the pick-up calls.

On a recent night, a call came over the police radio at 9:57 p.m. for a pick-up at the pay phone in Pioneer Square's Occidental Park.


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A woman with feathered hair and a green hooded sweat shirt waved to Wendy Pompey, the patrol supervisor. She's a regular.

"Just about everybody we pick up is happy to see us," said Pompey. "The first priority is getting these guys off the street, get them safe, where they don't have to worry about someone stabbing them."

Before the van could pull away, a middle-aged man spotted it, crossed South Main Street and climbed into the back seat.

By 10:08 p.m., with three people in the van, First Avenue and Pike Street loomed. Five men, huddled in a doorway there, advanced when they saw the van's familiar flashing yellow and white lights.

"How ya doing, Charles?"

"You OK, Arthur?"

Rae and Mathers greet most of their clients by their first names, patting some on the backs, reserving inside jokes for others and trying to steady others who can't walk straight.

"They need attention," said Rae, 35, who has worked with the patrol since 1989. "They need to know they're going to go somewhere safe."

Inside the sobering center, an overwhelming stench of cheap liquor, sour vomit and dirty socks fills the air. Trained emergency technicians take their clients' temperatures, store their belongings in clear plastic bags and make sure they don't need more intensive medical care.

The disheveled men and women, some barely awake, grab large green plastic pillows and look for warm spots in one of two large rooms to bunk down and sleep off their intoxication.

"It's a merry-go-round," said Mathers, taking a break between runs. "They come back here every night."

P-I reporter Phuong Cat Le can be reached at 206-903-0370 or phuongle@seattlepi.com

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