Trinity Place
By Rick Steves
How and Why Rick Steves is Using
his Retirement Nest Egg to House Homeless Mothers & their Children
The Roots of this Project
In my early travels — my "Europe
through the gutter days," my main challenge each day was finding a safe
and affordable place to sleep. While traveling in Central
America, I learned about how a rich country's policies (in this
case, my country's) can cause landlessness (which means homelessness and
hunger) in an underdeveloped country. This creation of a landless peasantry
— at the mercy of an aggressive landowning class — reminded me of
European feudalism. To think that the structural poverty that characterized
those "dark ages" existed in our affluent and modern world was a
shock to me. Then, after reading progressive books on hunger and homelessness
(like Francis Moore Lappe's "Food First,"
Noam Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent," and Arthur Simon's
"Bread for the World"), I saw how structural poverty was an almost
invisible but very real by-product of American capitalism, both within our
country and abroad.
In about 1990, I had brainstorming sessions with my pastor on ways to house
our local homeless. I came to believe that this is a real problem that the
vast majority of people in our community choose not to see. To me, the
problem had urgency and I wanted to do something about it. The next month, a
ratty duplex adjacent to our church came up for sale. My wife, Anne, and I
had enough money to buy it ($80,000), and with the help of our church
(Trinity Lutheran in Lynnwood) congregation to help maintain it, we offered
it to Pathways for Women, a local non-profit that works with the YWCA to
house local homeless moms and their kids.
Over the next decade, the duplex's three sisters on the same street went
up for sale — each at an opportune time for us — and by the
mid-1990s we had eight units in four duplexes in use housing homeless single
mothers and their children. Eventually the buildings developed a mold problem
and became uninhabitable. In 2002, we realized to ever have these buildings
usable again; we'd need to invest lots of money in a clean up.
But to me, this was actually good mold. God was in that mold. We
brainstormed — and the right move became clear. We'd tear down the
duplexes and replace them with four-plexes,
doubling the people we could house and creating a little community we'd call Trinity Way.
Trinity Way:
a Pathways/YWCA/Rotary Club/Steves Collaboration
Until now this project was simply Anne and I offering the use of the
duplexes to Pathways. This new vision was to solely finance 16 new units,
deal with zone changes, plan thoughtfully, and oversee the construction.
While we are providing the land and all the cash for the project (up to our
$1 million ceiling for the four 4-plexes), our partners were providing
substantial and essential services, without which, Trinity Way could never happen. The
Rotary club joined in to monitor the project to completion with their many
talented members (architecture, project management, city relations,
landscaping, furnishing, and so on). Anne and I would promise the free use of
our buildings for 15 years. The Rotary Club would contribute various services
as needed over the years. And Pathways/YWCA would manage the project with an
obligation to the Steves to use the buildings to
the absolute maximum capacity.
Defeated by Modern
Building Codes:
Our hope was to build Trinity
Way for our $1 million budget. We demolished the
old duplexes, hired an architect, contracted with a builder, and barreled
ahead with our vision. Slowly it became clear, modern American building codes
simply do not allow for basic utilitarian construction to provide safe and
comfortable yet sparse temporary housing for homeless people. The buildings,
the land…even the sidewalks needed "contour" so they would
look nice. Landscaping requirements chipped away at play zones. Financial
setback after setback drove the price up until a $200,000 drainage
requirement drove the building price to $1.6 million — well beyond our
combined budgets — and finally sealed the fate of the project. It was
no longer a wise use of our limited capital.
A New Direction: Renovate an Existing Apartment "Trinity Place"
Rather than invest $1.6 million plus the land for 16 new units, we decided
to look for existing apartment buildings (which would enable us to buy into the
standards of an age with simpler codes). Trinity Way would become Trinity Place. We
located a 24-unit complex for the same amount of money (and that came with
land to boot). Back on track, our vision — born in El Salvador, and matured with a long march
through church meetings, mold, and suburban Seattle zoning codes — was finally
within reach.
The location of Trinity Place
couldn't be handier for people in transition (good access to public transit,
groceries, Edmonds
Community College,
church). Purchasing the apartment in April, 2005, our partners (Pathways, the
YWCA, and the Rotary Club) will renovate and units and we'll be housing
single mothers and their children by summer, 2005.
Why Homelessness? Why Pathways?
As a man (in a male-dominated world), I take partial responsibility for
the plight of women abandoned by their husbands to raise children alone.
Pathways (which joined forces with the YWCA a few years ago) works very
effectively in my community with exactly that problem as its focus. For me, Pathways/YWCA
is not a charity. It's a service. I pay them to translate my excess
productivity into fighting this problem. Since I've already consumed all I
really need, this gives me the treat of vicarious consumption. It's a fun way
to consume beyond my capacity.
Single moms have so many cards stacked against them and society almost
seems to blame them. I have an affinity for these women because I have
friends and relatives who have been in this overwhelming and very
discouraging me-and-my-kids-against-the-world situation.
I think the issue of homelessness strikes a chord with me, in part,
because of my travels. For years, as a teenage vagabond slumming around
Europe not knowing where'd I'd sleep tonight — sleeping in train
stations, or sacked-out, frightened, in city parks — allows me to
relate to being cold, wet and lonely through the night. While this was a
perspective-altering experience, I had no kids to care for and a plane ticket
home. I can't imagine the weight of having no money, no roof over my head, no
job, and small children to care for.
Mixing Motivations: as a Christian and as a Businessman
As a businessman, I feel it's a responsibility to make a real commitment
to my community. And, it's my hope that a project like this — utilizing
a local agency like Pathways/YWCA as a service more than a charity —
will inspire business people to think creatively about making a real
difference this way. In a time with greater human need and lesser return on
conventional investments, simply redefining "returns" suddenly
makes this a smart use of capital.
As a Christian, I believe in tithing. And as a Christian businessman, I
think a business can have this kind of giving as a goal too. A business has a
lot of potential for good in its community. In my creative charitable
initiatives, I hope to inspire other business people to do more than canned
food drives. I was inspired this way back in the early 1980s when I met with
a group of local business people who were supporters of Seattle's World Concern (a relief agency
working for caring Seattleites in the developing world). I hope Trinity Place
inspires other individuals, businesses, and charitable organizations to
creatively use their capital (even if on a smaller scale) to buy simple
existing housing to equip non-profits to help our homeless.
We Can Make a Choice: A Thousand Points of Light or an Enlightened
Society
As an American and a liberal, I'm tired of hearing people say
"there's not enough money." With any honest assessment, there is
enough money. But we as a society have different priorities. As a Democrat, I
believe providing affordable housing (like health care and education) is a
responsibility of society in general — implemented efficiently by
government. But I'm willing for now to be proceeding in the "thousand
points of light" and "faith-based" Republican style which
prefers to let the people who really care handle the problem apart from
government involvement. But I do this under protest. I believe this can and
should be performed most fairly and efficiently with governmental initiative
by society as a whole. In short, an enlightened society brightens its world
in unison and doesn't need a thousand points of light.
A Political Backdrop…Driven by "Class Warfare"
I believe our current government is motivated primarily by the greed of
its corporate and wealthy patrons. President Bush's passions need to be
understood in economic terms — how each initiative enriches the groups
whose financial support put him and his party in power. Military expenses (about
50 percent of our governments discretionary budget and as much as the rest of
the world combined) enriches Americans who make and sell arms. Privatization
of social security pumps more money into Wall Street. Prescription benefits
drives up the deficit (which future tax payers will have to pay) in order to
enrich the pharmaceuticals. Our "war on terror" allows
us to secure oil and gas interests in West Asia and the Middle
East. ("Freedom" for Afghanistan means huge new
military bases protecting a vital new gas pipeline through that country
— which almost no one sees as taxpayer-subsidized corporate welfare.)
Tax cuts for the wealthy and various forms of corporate welfare make it
urgent that we squeeze "discretionary domestic" budget items (which
is a kind of warfare on the poor both in America and abroad). All the
domestic squeezing in the name of fiscal discipline saves around $60 billion.
This is a paltry number compared to the hidden windfall each category above
brings to corporations and the wealthy. The last thing a wealthy person like
me needs is a huge tax cut. You'd be surprised (and probably outraged) if you
know how much money I have saved as President Bush has cut my taxes in order
to squeeze our poor and inflate our deficit.
Global needs trumped by local homelessness
For me proximity has nothing to do with suffering and need. I believe that
if $1,000 helps more people in a distant land than here in the USA,
investing it abroad is better stewardship of that charitable resource. That
can be a tough sell in America.
And many believe in "keeping it local" and helping the person
across the street rather than across the ocean. You can't jam a world
perspective into the minds of people who have not traveled. And people who've
not traveled are often actually put off by a global concern that has no local
concern element to it.
In investing my retirement funds in Trinity Place, I know that same money
could help more people in a developing nation. While over the last 20 years
I've enjoyed many creative charitable ventures for hungry and homeless people
oversees, now my wife and I want to balance that with this local initiative.
After Trinity Place is up and running, we can focus vigorously on more
distant concerns knowing that we're balanced with a strong and local project.
I hope this will help people be more open to my global perspective on human
needs.
The Financial Arrangement Between the Steves and Pathways/YWCA
The Steves provide and own the apartment
complex. Pathways and the Rotary club see that the units are renovated and
fit to house clients of Pathways/YWCA. Pathways/YWCA will manage the project
in a way where the Steves have no risk, no expense,
and no income for 15 years. During this time, Pathways will charge a small
rent to its clients who stay in Trinity
Place in order to have a budget covering taxes,
insurance, utilities, and general maintenance. The Steves
own the buildings and have the option to take them back for their own
non-charitable use after 15 years, with one-year notice. In 15 years, we turn
65 and will have access to the buildings for our retirement if we choose.
Are you not just enabling people to live off charity?
The "give a man a fishwich and he's fed for
a day or give him a net and teach him to fish and he's fed for a
lifetime" thinking is pure wisdom to Anne and I.
So when we support something, we want to do it in a way that empowers people
to become self-sufficient. Providing a resource for Pathways for Women/YWCA
to house homeless moms and their kids empowers Pathways to do the important
work they are so good at: helping these single mothers get back on track and
build lives in which they can raise their children with dignity. I meet
people routinely here in Edmonds
who came upon tough times, were supported by Pathways, and are now happy and
well-settled members of our community again. I wish these success stories
made headlines.
Smart Investing — From "Europe
on $5 a day" to "Dignity on $3 a day."
From a practical point of view, this "investment" is ideal for
anyone who can enjoy the "vicarious" consumption of a homeless
person getting a safe and comfortable place to sleep. Think of our rewards.
Put a $1.4 million in a CD and you earn maybe $80,000 in taxable interest
(which would be about $50,000 after taxes). With this investment, our taxable
income is zero. But we know that we are providing 24 moms and probably 46
children a home. That's housing for about 70 people at a cost to us of $800 a
year (less than $3 a day) each. In my work of finding budget travel places to
eat and sleep, this is a real turn-on. So, that's my selfish little pleasure:
I stow my money in a safe place and as a return, rather than taxable income,
Anne and I know we're housing all these people. What would we do consuming an
extra $50,000 a year? How much joy would that car, condo at Whistler, yacht,
or whatever bring us? About one percent of the joy
that the 70 people we're helping (indirectly through the work of
Pathways/YWCA). That's our kind of investment. And, by partnering with hard
working charities whose passions are the same as yours, you don't need a
million dollars to get these royal returns. This isn't altruism, it's just
awake.
The Same Vision on a Smaller Scale (with $200,000 to "invest")
On a smaller scale, an affordable housing investor could invest $200,000
in a simple duplex; let their church or local homeless organization use the
property. Rather than $14,000 in taxable interest (about $9,000 after tax
annually), you're housing two families — six people. Real people being
housed by you for $1,500 a year or $5 a day each…what a wonderful kind
of passive income.
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