Outside the only nightly young-adult shelter in the U-District, dozens of people wait — hoping to be taken off the waiting list and given shelter for the night. With the expansion of the shelter, they might not have to hope.
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Ben Wolzfelt, a guest at ROOTS, and Kristine Cunningham, ROOTS executive director, sit at the entrance to the young-adult shelter.
The young-adult shelter Rising Out of the Shadows (ROOTS), located under University Temple United Methodist Church on Northeast 43rd Street, was granted a $500,000 grant this month by the Raynier Institution & Foundation, which will allow the shelter to rebuild and expand its space to accommodate more guests each night.
Brad Trenary, board member of the Raynier Institution & Foundation, said ROOTS makes an important contribution to the Seattle community.
“We are thrilled with what ROOTS does,” Trenary said. “We think ROOTS is one of the greatest gifts to homeless young adults in Seattle.”
About 600 homeless people ages 18 to 25 live in the Seattle area, ROOTS Executive Director Kristine Cunningham said, and this past year ROOTS turned away 2,103 visits due to lack of space.
“We’d be at least a step closer,” Cunningham said about the expansion. “It’s a drop in the bucket, but it’s a good drop in the bucket. It’s moving in the right direction.”
The expansion allows ROOTS to house 45 homeless young adults instead of the previous 27. Currently, if over 27 guests sign up for the shelter, a random selection determines who gets turned away for the night. The construction, which is scheduled to begin in August and last three months, will take place during the day and will not significantly affect ROOTS’ overnight shelter.
While the grant was not enough to buy a new building, Cunningham said the current location near the UW is ideal because most of ROOTS’ volunteers are UW students.
UW senior Amanda Mendoza, a volunteer at ROOTS, said the shelter has been turning down a lot more people over the summer. It’s the regulars, though, who benefit from the ROOTS community the most, she said.
“I’ve made a lot of connections with guests I see every week,” Mendoza said. “When they have something good [happen] in their lives, they can’t wait to share it with us. … We’d know what’s going on. We’d be a substitute for a family member who hasn’t been around.”
Ben Wolzfelt, age 25, is currently homeless and seeks shelter daily at ROOTS. He was placed on the waiting list one night and said the experience was scary because he didn’t know what he was going to do for that night if he didn’t get in.
“I think it’s a wonderful thing,” Wolzfelt said about the expansion. “Especially in this area, it will get a lot more people off the waiting list [and to] just do what they need to [do] to get back on their feet.”
Wolzfelt recently lost his job and said that, like many of the homeless young adults he sees at ROOTS, his situation is a temporary setback.
“You do hear a lot at night … about plans for the future,” Wolzfelt said of the conversations the guests engage in at the shelter. “They’re normally striving towards something.”
Cunningham said many of the homeless youth who seek shelter at ROOTS don’t mind the rules and order that come with the shelter and have ambitions about their futures.
“Just having a predictable place to be safe for one night helps them put the wind in their sails,” Cunningham said. “These are folks that just need a really solid foundation to jump off from.”
With the expansion, the hygiene center will also have four bathrooms instead of three, which Cunningham said is a critical aspect of what the homeless youth need in a shelter.
She added that, while the shelter will not change significantly in appearance, the remodeling will allow the shelter to function more efficiently because of the more open space and improved hygiene center.
“The walls don’t really change that much, but the improvements will be vast as far as how the shelter feels and how it operates,” Cunningham said.
The overnight guests receive accommodations such as toiletries, nursing facilities, underwear and laundry services.
“We are kind of taking it on faith [that we can] grow our income to accommodate the extra people,” Cunningham said.
Cunningham calls ROOTS a community crucial for those who are homeless and don’t have the support they need — a community those who are turned away miss out on.
“They don’t have that circle of support,” Cunningham said. “We’re that circle for these guys. We’re it. That’s a part of how poverty and oppression work. Until the community claims them, that cycle perpetuates.”
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