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Tacoma is dealing with its own homelessness crisis here.

The city provides the most shelter beds and services for Pierce County while there is an increasing uptick in people outside the city limits using those resources.

In my one on one conversation with Mayor Anders Ibsen six months into his administration, he explains how the city is working to address the problem.

As many know, the city provides the bulk of shelters and services to Pierce County.

Where is progress today to get unhoused people into permanent housing?

-Well, as part of that, we're looking longer term at one of those root causes.

And it's exactly what you mentioned.

Tacoma has 20% of the region's population.

We have 80% of the region's housing and services in beds.

And that's completely unfair.

And it's also impractical because we are very focused on budget sustainability.

We're just as challenged as everyone else, and it's really imperative that everyone in the county pulls their weight.

And I'm glad to report that we are making progress there.

We're engaged in what's called a unified regional approach, in partnership with Pierce County, with our surrounding suburban friends, and we are working on a process of reducing duplication and ensuring greater accountability by ensuring that everyone is using the same data system so that folks actually get help, instead of having to relive their trauma time and time again with organizations, for example.

You can imagine, homelessness is is immensely complex, but ultimately we have to look at the root causes.

We have to look at advocating for preventing people from falling through the cracks in the first place, through a smart, more robust, affordable housing strategy.

Building opportunities by providing for more living wage opportunities for our youth and for our adult workforce.

-Next time, you'll hear Mayor Ibsen share the city's strategic plan to make housing more accessible for those who want to buy.

I'm Paris Jackson.

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