Last December, the Biden Administration released one of the most disturbing reports in Washington State history. It revealed that the level of homeless suffering continues to grow to an all-time record level of 31,554 experiencing homelessness in our state despite numerous taxpayer funded programs. Yet Democrat legislators have done nothing during the 2025 legislative session to end the pain of those living on the streets.

Even though our state has one of the most productive private sectors in the country (with Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, Costco, etc.),  a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development report found that the government’s failed “housing first” policies have made the state’s homeless crisis the third worst in the country, with a 77% increase in the homeless population during the Inslee administration.

Even more disturbing is that Washington has the highest number of chronic homeless individuals in the nation, surpassing such populous states as California, New York, and Texas. Over 4,000 homeless people have failed to receive help from government programs, primarily due to challenges related to addiction and mental health issues.

So given this calamitous report, one would expect our elected leaders propose innovative new programs to solve the problem, especially solutions focused on treatment since 2/3 of homeless individuals self-diagnose that they suffer from addiction and/or mental health issues (the true figure is likely higher).

This has not occurred. Evidently our state’s majority party was unmoved by the federal report which clearly shows our state is failing to effectively help those who are homeless.

Since the Democrats have complete control of state government, they can only blame themselves for the cruel continuance of expensive homeless policies that will result in more people living on the streets.

As the 2025 session winds down, the Democrat-controlled legislature’s main achievement on the homelessness issue is funding the Department of Commerce efforts to help local governments expand their homeless bureaucracies. They are working on another bill that will allow local governments to raise property taxes  more quickly to pay for this bureaucratic expansion. .

Other than increasing property taxes, the only homelessness-related bills to receive attention were a proposal (HB 1830) to make homelessness a right (forcing local governments to go through expensive legal proceedings to remove illegal encampments) and another (HB 1217) to impose rent control.

Fortunately, legislators listened to local officials’ concerns with HB 1830, and this costly bill failed to advance out of committee.

The state senate passed a slightly watered-down rent control bill with less restrictive limits than the proposed legislation (10%, plus the rate of inflation, instead of the original 7%). Yet if passed, the “beachhead legislation” will provide a starting point for future extreme politicians to impose harsher limits on property owners. Even if the less-restrictive version passes both chambers and is signed by the governor, we can expect to see many rental units pulled from the market. This will hurt lower-income residents the harshest.

Now that the session is nearly complete, we must view this as yet another missed opportunity by the legislature. Once again it failed to pass a homelessness bill that is less focused on building a large housing bureaucracy and more concerned with providing treatment for homeless people.

Instead, the legislature spent time strategizing how to remove citizens from the lawmaking process, remove parents from decisions about their child, remove George Washington from the state flag, and remove commonsense from the criminal sentencing process.

It is hard to imagine any legislator reading the HUD report and not realizing that Washington State’s homeless strategy is a cruel failure that is causing thousands to suffer. Wouldn’t it make sense to explore alternative programs like the one in Austin, Texas that focuses on treatment and have an 85% success rate?

How much more suffering must take place before Democrats finally move towards treatment-based solutions to solve the state’s solvable homelessness crisis?  Until then, we are wasting time, money, and lives.