Suddenly, we have a bunch of new neighbors down the street — the parking lot at St. Joe’s is now home to Seattle’s Tent City. While we were a bit surprised to see the rows of tents appear out of nowhere, we’re cool with it. Not sure we’d be down with the blue tarp action on a permanent basis but hosting for a few weeks is probably good for everybody’s karma.
Here is a calendar of social events involving St. Joe’s and Tent City. Tonight is their ice cream social which sounds like a good excuse to check things out and get involved if you have time.
Here’s what Seattle’s archdiocese has to say about Tent City and the people involved. For more on tent city projects around the country, check out this Seattle Weekly article.
We do have to say that St. Joe’s didn’t exactly put the word out that this was happening. Of course, they seem to have good reason not to make a deal given the NIMBY action of the past. You can see some of the responses St. Joe’s was up against in this letter to parishioners from 2003. Nice to think Tent City’s appearance on this part of Capitol Hill has settled into a peaceful groove.
–j
I think that they did send out enough information. We knew about this event well beforehand. I do not attend church at St. Joe’s. They are required to tell people within two blocks.
Fair enough. We didn’t hear about it. But we don’t hear about lots of things.