Tacoma reports more than 300 fire calls related to homelessness over past year
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- Tacoma Fire responded to over 300 fire-related calls tied to the unhoused in 2024-25.
- Improperly discarded smoking items and cooking fires fueled most incidents reported.
- City disputes link between fire reduction and expanded waste removal at encampments.
The Tacoma Fire Department reported responding to more than 300 calls related to fires suspected to be caused by people living unhoused in the past year.
Chelsea Shepherd, public information officer for the Tacoma Fire Department, told The News Tribune neither the department nor the National Fire Incident Reporting System have “encampment”, “homeless”, or “unhoused” categories when reporting fire incident data.
However, the department was able to provide an incident count for “suspected homeless-related fires.”
Between May 2024 and May 2025, Tacoma Fire responded to 280 calls categorized as outside rubbish, vehicle, building, cooking, trash, brush, or other type of fires; 56 calls categorized as smoke or odor investigations; 6 calls categorized as unauthorized burning; and 33 service calls where the fire was already out upon our arrival or no fire was found.
Shepherd said that number is down from the year prior, which recorded nearly 600 fires suspected to be homeless-related.
Fires at encampments can be difficult for responders to access, often occurring in undeveloped green spaces. A privately-owned undeveloped lot in West Tacoma warranted several fire responses last summer.
On June 4, Tacoma Fire responded to a large encampment fire at North Levee Road East and Ferguson Road East in Fife. The fire was so large a plume of black smoke could be seen from miles away.
“We sent several extra resources to this fire due to the challenging nature of the fire’s location that was tough to access,” Shepherd told The News Tribune in an email. “We sent 3 engines, the brush truck (used to access places the engines can’t reach), the tender (to provide an additional water supply), a battalion chief, a safety officer, and one aid unit.”
After extinguishing the roughly 200-square-foot brush fire, Tacoma Fire shared photos of what appeared to be four propane tanks that were engulfed in the flames.
Shepherd said fires used to stay warm and cook food can get out of control, causing larger brush fires. She said improperly discarded smoking materials are the most common cause of fires caused by those living unhoused.
She said encampment fires become more common in the summer and winter.
“Generally speaking, we see a lot of warming fires getting out of control in the winter and a lot of cooking fires getting out of control in the summer when things dry out,” she told The News Tribune.
Jake Nau is a street outreach manager for St. Vincent de Paul. His job is to visit those living unhoused around Tacoma. Nau told The News Tribune he often sees fires or evidence of fires during those visits.
He said fires are primarily used to cook food and stay warm. In the winter, hand sanitizer is a popular item distributed by homeless outreach workers. He said it used to start and fuel fires as it burns clean and hot.
Nau said people living unhoused also use fires to get rid of trash and bio-waste.
“All camps everywhere would prefer to have access to garbage services, and most camps would stay reasonably clean and safe if offered weekly trash removal by the city,” Nau told The News Tribune. “Unfortunatley, this rarely happens, and when folks can’t figure another way to get their biowastes removed and other trash under control, they either leave it or burn it.”
The city said it does not believe helping remove waste from encampments would mitigate fires and maintains that waste-removal services are available to those living in encampments.
“The City does not have data to suggest that individuals are intentionally starting fires as a method of waste disposal or to definitively conclude that waste removal services at encampments would decrease the number or severity of fires,” Maria Lee, spokesperson for the City of Tacoma, told The News Tribune.
Lee said the city’s homeless street outreach staff provide purple bags and other garbage bags for waste accumulation. Green Earthworks Construction is contracted to collect those bags when they are full.
Additionally, she said, the city’s outreach team regularly cleans and tidies up encampments to manage waste, independent of full encampment removals.
This story was originally published June 15, 2025 at 5:15 AM.
