Spokane Municipal Code

Title 18 Human Rights

Chapter 18.05 HOME Starts Here Initiative

Section 18.05.080 H.O.M.E. Starts Here Initiative

The City of Spokane has identified the following strategic priorities to achieve housing stability, reduce and prevent homelessness, and ensure public health and safety:

1. Healthcare System

1. Prioritize access to quality behavioral health substance use disorder treatment services and coordinated case management that ends the cycle of “high utilizers” bouncing between the legal system, healthcare system, and homeless crisis response system.

2. Grow the City’s proven alternative response models, including the Spokane Fire Department’s CARES and alternative response teams, that meet individuals in crisis where they are and divert them from the legal system and emergency healthcare system to substance use treatment services or other appropriate options.

3. Collaborate with local educational institutions, non-profit organizations, and private-sector leaders to strengthen the service provider workforce by improving working conditions and eliminating the shortage of social workers, mental health counselors, and substance use outreach workers throughout the region.

4. Sustain the expanded street medicine partnership with local healthcare providers that provide primary care services to people experiencing homelessness to address wound care, foot care, referral coordination, resource navigation, and emergency services coordination.

5. Partner with Spokane County to leverage resources/relationships with local healthcare providers and institutions to build out a recovery campus where there is “no wrong door” for individuals in crisis.

6. Support the development of additional medication-assisted treatment services, sobering beds, culturally specific treatment services, and crisis relief and stabilization facilities. 

2. Outreach and Navigation

1. 1. Achieve a percentage of exits from the homeless crisis response system to permanent housing that is equal or better than the performance of top-performing homeless crisis response systems nationwide.

1. 2. Execute a best-practice navigation center model that provides humane, referral-first, emergency housing to individuals based on their specific subpopulation and needs, using microsites geographically distributed throughout the region.

1. 3. Expand and strengthen data-proven successful diversion and progressive engagement policies and programs that prevent homelessness, including rapid rehousing, emergency financial assistance, rental assistance, utility assistance, and eviction prevention.

1. 4. Implement and maintain a performance-based project funding model and mobilize public, private, and non-profit resources to ensure taxpayers (a) invest in programs that verifiably achieve and exceed system targets and (b) witness the positive outcomes of those interventions.

1. 5. Utilize high-quality data, including but not limited to By-Name Lists and mapping technology, to identify micro-locations for housing-focused street outreach that navigate individuals through the homeless crisis response system and eventually to permanent housing.

3. Multidisciplinary Engagement

1. 1. Engage in problem-solving, place-based, and person-focused policing that proactively addresses the underlying social causes of crime, in collaboration with community partners, as demonstrated through the City’s CORE Program and Neighborhood Resource Officer program.

1. 2. Increase diversion of non-emergent police calls for service to other resources, such as behavioral health and substance use treatment professionals, so as to free up patrol officers to attend to other emergent calls.

1. 3. Coordinate law enforcement, code enforcement, housing-focused outreach, and street medicine resources to quickly engage people experiencing homelessness to resolve and prevent unauthorized encampments and navigate individuals voluntarily into diversion programs, trauma-informed care, and permanent housing solutions.

1. 4. Safeguard Community Justice Services programs and therapeutic courts that have a documented and proven history of reducing recidivism, including Community Court, Domestic Violence Intervention Treatment Court, Veterans’ Enhanced Therapeutic Court, and the City/County Mental Health Court.

1. 5. Partner with state and federal resources to detect, disrupt, and prosecute drug trafficking and serious narcotics offenses impacting residents and neighborhoods.

4. Economic Security

1. 1. Reduce intergenerational poverty by leading regional economic development and workforce training efforts that grow and retain local businesses, improve economic competitiveness and readiness, and remove barriers to family-wage jobs that increase cash income and provide economic security through stable career paths.

1. 2. Facilitate the building of all types of housing at all income levels through housing-focused zoning policies and innovative housing programs with an emphasis on enhancing:

1. 1. 1. access to homeownership opportunities for first-time homebuyers and families that have been historically and disproportionately impacted by displacement, redlining, steering, racially restrictive real estate covenants, and zoning actions that have contributed to patterns of inequity; and

1. 1. 2. accessible housing choices for fixed-income seniors and individuals with disabilities, especially affordable housing near transit lines. 

1. 3. Advance education efforts to improve awareness of and participation rates in earned benefit programs, such as the Working Families Tax Credit, Earned Income Tax Credit, Low Income Utility Credit program, and Senior Citizen Property Tax Exemption.

1. 4. Advocate for the preservation and sustainability of critical state and federal programs that keep families economically secure, such as Social Security, Medicaid/Apple Health, Medicare, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)/Basic Food, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), and the Housing Choice Voucher Program.

1. 5. Bolster safe and cost-effective transportation choices that reduce commute times to school and employment opportunities and lessen the financial burden of transportation on households.

5. Accountability and Review

1. 1. Commencing June 1, 2026, the city departments, as directed by the Mayor, shall publish a semi-annual report evaluating the implementation of the H.O.M.E. Starts Here initiative.

1. 2. The City Council may hold public hearings to review findings from the semi-annual report and adjust funding, policy goals, and performance indicators as necessary to meet the objectives of this Chapter.

 

Date Passed: Monday, June 16, 2025

Effective Date: Wednesday, July 30, 2025

ORD C36691 Section 4