Bellingham, Whatcom County help YWCA establish emergency shelter for women, children

Bellingham and Whatcom County officials are contributing nearly $2.5 million to help the Bellingham YWCA buy and remodel a former medical center to shelter as many as 20 unhoused women and their accompanying children ages five and under.

A measure authorizing $1 million from local sales and use taxes for the $2.2 million purchase of the former King Health building at 315 Lakeway Drive passed the County Council unanimously Tuesday night.

Whatcom County funds are coming through a 2020 state law that allows sales and use taxes to be used for affordable housing. Bellingham is providing a deferred loan of $1.39 million toward the deal, using a combination of local and federal funding, according to the contract approved Tuesday.

Officials with the YWCA, the city of Bellingham and the Whatcom County Department of Health and Community Services announced details of the purchase in a statement released Wednesday morning.

“This new shelter will help fill a significant gap in services. August Whatcom County housing pool data indicate that around 130 unhoused single women with children would potentially qualify to stay at the new facility,” the statement said.

“We are grateful to be able to provide some much-needed support in our community to those who are particularly vulnerable,” YWCA CEO Alle Schene said in the statement.

Pregnant women will also be eligible for services through the shelter.

“Many shelters serving individuals do not allow guests to stay after the birth of their child. This shelter will offer a solution that supports pregnant people with wrap-around services before and after the birth of their child,” the release states.

If rooms cannot be filled with the primary population of mothers with young children, a secondary population of senior women over the age of 55, with priority given to those 62 and over, will fill vacant units.

The shelter will serve women whose income is at or below 60% of the area median income, which is $79,220, according to the latest U.S. Census data.

Whatcom County’s 2024 Annual Update on Homelessness showed that the most common reason reported for an individual’s homelessness was a lack of affordable housing. More than half of all Whatcom County renters are cost-burdened, meaning they spend thirty percent or more of their income on housing costs.

The report also showed that Whatcom County saw a slight decrease in unhoused families with children and unhoused seniors, which could be an indication that increased local resources targeting those populations are working.

Schene told The Bellingham Herald in an email that a few tenants remain in the acquired building, but “the YWCA will be working closely with them to provide relocation assistance.”

The new shelter could be ready in late winter or early spring, Health Department spokeswoman Marie Duckworth told The Herald.

Bellingham is using a grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the state Affordable Housing Sales Tax to boost the YWCA’s shelter project, Ryan KeyWynne of the Bellingham Department of Planning and Community Development.

“The YWCA will be provided these funds in the form of a deferred loan, requiring continued service to this population, with a covenant recorded on the land to remain for 50 years or until funds are repaid, whichever is longer,” Key-Wynne told The Herald in an email.