How a Pierce County city used jobs to help quell its homelessness crisis
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Fife launched a 2021 jobs program housing and employing unhoused residents.
- Participants work parks three days weekly, receive training, case management.
- Program cost about $17,500 per person yearly; 63% find housing or jobs.
After homeless encampments swelled during the pandemic, the City of Fife realized sweeping them would be unsustainable. So as part of its approach, it started a program to employ the unhoused in an attempt to address the root cause.
Megan Jendrick, assistant city manager for the City of Fife, gave a presentation on the program during the Pierce County Council’s Health and Human Services Committee meeting on Oct. 21.
Fife’s jobs program began in 2021 when a perfect storm of circumstances led the city to have some of the largest encampments in the region.
Jendrick told the council the city tends to attract a larg transient population with the Port of Tacoma, Interstate 5, Pacifice Highway and state Route 167 all converging in or near the city.
She said one of the biggest issues the city encountered during the pandemic was that the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) owns large swaths of land across the city.
“During the pandemic that undeveloped right-of-way became home to several very large encampments with literally hundreds of people living outdoors,” Jendrick said.
During the pandemic, the state determined that the governor’s eviction moratorium applied to people camping on right-of-ways owned by the state.
“Which meant that the City of Fife was mostly powerless to address the rapidly expanding encampments within the city,” she said.
According to Fife, the city had over 550 people living outdoors at the peak of the encampment growth during 2023 - a number that equates to about 5% of the city’s population.
Jendrick said Fife spent nearly six figures to remove and clean an encampment in the Hylebos Wetlands, leading to a realization that the approach would be “unsustainable.”
Homeless jobs program begins
In 2021, Fife started the jobs program by building a tent village in an overflow lot owned by the Police Department. The city eventually built 10 60-square-foot living units, two ADA units, an office portable with a kitchen, dining room and laundry facilities, as well as showers and restrooms.
During the Oct. 21 meeting, director of human resources for Fife, Beth Brooks, spoke about the jobs program she helped set up.
Brooks said participants typically work in the city’s parks doing landscaping and maintenance. They work three days a week for about 18 hours. They are paid minimum wage and can earn $0.50 cent raises as they progress through the program.
Two days a week are spent doing required training, social outings and grocery shopping.
Brooks said participants work closely with city employees and parks department staff to “tidy up” the campus of the city.
Participants also receive case management. Brooks said the city utilizes a 12-month case-management program which begins with goals, such as creating and maintaining a schedule or creating a savings account, and ends with applying for jobs and education and creating a plan to obtain permanent housing.
According to Jendrick, 63% of participants in the program are housed or employed, and participants who leave the program earn an average of more than $22-per-hour.
Reasons participants drop out of the program include addiction, violence and mental health issues. Jendrick said not everyone is a fit for the program.
Norman Brickhouse is the community navigator manager for the city’s Homeless Outreach Department. In an interview with The News Tribune, Brickhouse said the city conducts a series of interviews with candidates interested in the program.
The city will do a background check to make sure candidates do not have certain violent offenses on their record and a drug test to see if they use controlled substances. Candidates for the job program have to complete substance abuse treatment before beginning the program if they test positive.
“Once you are in the program, we help you as long as there is no violence or disrespect,” Brickhouse said.
With about 30 people in the program a year, Jendrick said the program costs about $17,500 per person to operate annually. That includes the wages participants are paid, as well as staff costs.
According to the city, 64 people have been enrolled in the program since it began.
Jendrick said the city paid for the village with roughly $350,000 in federal American Rescue Plan Act dollars. The city also secured a grant from the state to support homeless programs in public right-of-ways, which gave the city an additional $365,000 to support the completion of the permanent village and to support its operation with an additional $500,000 over the next few years.
A congressional allocation of $3.5 million will support the program from July of this year through 2030.
This story was originally published October 30, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
