Inside Bellingham’s 22 North, a path for many away from unsheltered life on the street

Inside Look is a Bellingham Herald series where we take readers behind the scenes at restaurants, new businesses, local landmarks and news stories.

A housing program centrally located in downtown Bellingham called 22 North offers 40 units of affordable permanent supportive housing for formerly unhoused individuals.

The program, which is publicly and privately funded, has a yearly operation cost of about $1.76 million.

It has recently come under public scrutiny amid concerns about the program’s safety due to instances of crime, drug use and at least six death investigations on site in the first six months of 2024, and the 2022 shooting death of a resident.

In response, Whatcom County Councilmember Ben Elenbaas introduced a measure in July to cut 22 North’s funding and turn it into a secure detox facility. The council ultimately rejected the measure .

The Bellingham Herald got an inside look at 22 North in August to hear from Opportunity Council about the importance of the housing program and its impact on the community.

The case for ‘housing first’

Operated by the Opportunity Council, 22 North offers a housing-first model to help stabilize chronically unhoused adults with disabilities, young adults and veterans. The goal is to offer wraparound support services in conjunction with permanent housing.

“This whole program is really based on the premise that housing is a necessary foundation for health,” Opportunity Council Executive Director Greg Winter told The Herald.

Approximately 100 residents have made 22 North their home since the facility opened in 2018, according to the Opportunity Council.

Although transitioning residents into other permanent housing is not an expectation or goal of the program, 16 of 22 North’s residents have moved into other stable housing environments. An additional 24 of the current residents have lived there for a year or more.

Current and past 22 North residents by the numbers:

▪ 100% have a disability.

▪ 41% have a chronic health condition.

▪ 46% are domestic violence survivors.

▪ 34% have a substance-use disorder.

▪ 24% are 55 or older.

Although some housing and service providers disagree on the efficacy of the housing-first model, several studies have shown that compared with a treatment-first model, housing-first programs offer greater long-term housing stability and reduce costs for things like hospital stays and treatment programs, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Housing-first programs are also shown to be successful in housing people with intersecting vulnerabilities like substance abuse, mental illness and chronic medical conditions.

“If you imagine what it’s like to live on the street — to be living outside and unsheltered — expecting people living in those conditions to engage successfully in services that require them being to multiple appointments on time and comply with various rules of those services programs without having the stability, safety and security of knowing where they’re going to be at night, I think that’s just asking too much of many people,” Winter said.

“Without a housing-first approach, so many of our neighbors who are unsheltered would never get an opportunity to have those life-saving services,” Winter said.

What are wraparound services?

Residents at 22 North receive individualized and collaborative wraparound services.

Residents utilize the services voluntarily, which tends to be more successful than requiring services, according to the Opportunity Council. Residents work with a case manager to create a custom plan based on their individual goals and needs.

The program also has 24/7 residential counselors on site and community engagement programs to help connect residents to services outside of the housing program.

“Every resident has a case manager, is being checked on and offered services. That looks really different for every person,” Opportunity Council Permanent Supportive Housing Program Coordinator Allison Zell told The Herald. “We take a person-centered approach so it’s not a one-size-fits-all service approach. It’s very client-centered based on what their goals are and what we can do to support them.”

Supportive services can include:

▪ Looking for treatment.

▪ Finding alternative permanent housing.

▪ Finding employment.

▪ Finding and making an appointment with a primary care physician.

▪ Learning how to grocery shop and prepare food.

▪ Learning cleanliness and organizational habits for apartment living.

▪ Learning how to make and manage a financial budget.

Addressing the challenges at 22 North

Permanent Supportive Housing programs have higher mortality rates than average apartments, according to the Opportunity Council.

The 22 North program has seen many overdoses and overdose deaths on site as a result of the converging housing and fentanyl crises. Chronic homelessness is also shown to reduce average lifespan by about 17.5 years compared to the general population, according to a 2017 study.

The majority of residents living at 22 North do not have a substance-use disorder, according to Opportunity Council. However, there is still a higher percentage of people with substance-use disorders living at 22 North than in the general population.

On average, about 34% of 22 North residents have a substance-use disorder compared to about 17.3% of the general population.

“I think it’s really important to understand the context in which people are entering this program. Homelessness is very complex and often misunderstood. It can be really challenging to delve into,” Zell said. “Folks are entering this program after experiencing often years of trauma and survival. This program is offering them housing to address that safety need, and then focus on their other goals that follow that.”

Winter told The Herald the Opportunity Council is continuing to strengthen its partnerships with emergency medical providers, behavioral health specialists, and city and county government to better collaborate to address the ongoing health and safety concerns of 22 North residents.

“The permanent supportive housing first model as a resource for the community is just so precious. We have so few of these housing units to offer the community,” Winter said. “It’s really difficult to tell the story of how important it is but it’s so important that we have this resource. Otherwise, we are literally going to have more people die on the street.”