In fight against homelessness, let’s zero in on children

Danny Westneat:

The good news first: There are no more kids living at Seattle’s shantytown, the Nickelsville encampment in the Central Area.
“We got the last ones out, finally,” says the woman who set up the camp on South Jackson Street, Sharon Lee of the Low Income Housing Institute.
When she opened the temporary camp, Lee figured it would draw mostly single adults — “hardy people” who are used to camping outside. But she was bowled over when up to 15 kids, some as young as 3, were living there at one time in the fall.
The homeless newspaper Real Change dubbed it “Nickelsville Elementary.” I wrote in December about how kids living in unheated shacks was apparently now accepted in Seattle because a school bus stopped there each day, as if it were just another cul-de-sac.
Plenty of people offered to help with clothing or supplies, which was much appreciated. But it wasn’t what these kids needed most: a heated place to sleep.