Maybe not daily, but at least every other day. That's how often Pia Hallenberg says she has to clean up human feces outside her condo in downtown Spokane. The condo opens into a secluded alley, making it a convenient place for people to visit at night when downtown Spokane's few public restrooms are closed.
Hallenberg says she's frustrated and tired of the near daily cleanup, but she understands why it continues to happen.
"I don't blame people; if you gotta go, you gotta go," Hallenberg says.
Spokane's newly renovated North Bank of Riverfront Park added several public restrooms to downtown, but like most public facilities in Spokane, they close in the evening. There are a few other options, like the River Park Square shopping mall and the Spokane Transit Authority Plaza, but they aren't always open either.
There are also bathrooms in private businesses, but most are for paying customers only and, with the exception of a few gas stations, they also close at night. Downtown Spokane Partnership CEO Mark Richard says the number of downtown businesses that allow public bathroom use has decreased dramatically over the past five years because of issues with drug use and behavioral issues.
For people who are homeless, or even just trying to stay hydrated on a long walk, the lack of options can present some serious challenges.
"As it is right now, I can't say to somebody, 'Hey, you have to go somewhere else,'" Hallenberg says, "because there is no other place to go."
After conversations with the City Council this spring, the downtown Spokane Business Improvement District is in the process of forming a committee that will study current bathroom availability downtown and work with the city to find possible solutions to the shortage. The committee hasn't formally met yet, but Hallenberg, who is a residential representative of the Business Improvement District, says she has been asked to chair the committee.
City Councilwoman Karen Stratton says the conversation around bathrooms is taking off at an important time. She says she regularly gets phone calls and emails from constituents concerned about the lack of public bathrooms. Most of the concern is about the downtown area, but also in public parks and greater Spokane. (Stratton says her mother's house used to open into an alley; like Hallenberg, she has first-hand experience with the problem.)
People have tried to rally support for public bathrooms in the past, but they struggled to get the idea off the ground. Hallensberg, Stratton and others are confident things will be different this time. One main reason? Framing.
PUBLIC INFRASTRUCTURE OR HOMELESS SERVICES
In 2018, Councilwoman Kate Burke tried to gain support to purchase "Portland Loo" facilities designed to withstand the wear and tear of daily use. She raised the issue again after a 2019 hepatitis A outbreak that Spokane health officials linked to poor hygienic conditions affecting people who are unhoused, but the idea still failed to gain traction.Stratton says the problem was one of framing. Burke was approaching the bathroom issue as a homeless problem — raising concerns about drawing homeless people to the area.
Stratton says that while unhoused people are still an important part of the conversation, the issue is ultimately one that affects everybody — families, tourists, joggers, barhoppers, the elderly — because we all need to go sometimes. By framing the conversation in terms of public infrastructure, Stratton hopes to attract broader support.
"It's not just the homeless," Stratton says. "I think that's where people start getting a little cranky about it."
Melissa Morrison, the City Council's manager of housing and homelessness initiatives, has been researching the bathroom issue and gave a presentation about it to the City Council in the spring. Morrison says thinking about bathroom access as an infrastructure problem allows them to think more creatively about how a program could be managed. Instead of being run by Spokane's Communities Housing and Homeless Services department, a public restroom program could potentially be managed by the Spokane Water Department, Morrison says. She also noted the American Rescue Plan as a potential source of funding.
Cupid Alexander, the former director of neighborhoods, housing and human services, previously worked in Portland and had direct experience with the city's Portland Loo program. Richard says he had discussed the bathroom issue several times with Alexander before Alexander's abrupt exit in June, which put plans to further discuss the issue with the city on hold.
SEARCHING FOR SOLUTIONS
Hallenberg says she's been particularly interested in a program in San Francisco called the Pit Stop program. The program was started in 2014 by the Public Works Department in an attempt to reduce the amount of human waste on the streets. The program uses a combination of permanent bathroom pods and mobile trailers that can be moved to different parts of the city depending on where need is highest.Unlike some other models, all Pit Stop toilets are staffed by paid attendants who help make sure the bathrooms are maintained and used for their intended purpose. The staff are mainly people in work reentry programs.
Hallenberg says she doesn't think public bathrooms can be pulled off in Spokane without some sort of staffing. Vandalism and drug use have caused issues at public bathrooms in the past.
"Experience shows that it's going to get destroyed if there's nobody there," Hallenberg says.
Morrison and Stratton agree that public restrooms in Spokane would need some sort of staffing or security, at least to start. Morrison says she and Stratton met with a Denver City Council member who told them that staffing is important for making sure people feel safe at public restrooms. Morrison says research from Denver also shows that bathrooms need to be readily available — as frequent as every four blocks.
Morrison says she has also been looking into a program in Germany where private businesses receive money from the government in exchange for opening their facilities to the public and putting a sticker in their window to let people know their bathrooms are open to everyone, not just paying customers.
"I think it's dehumanizing to make people go to the bathroom in the streets. I think it's a terrible thing to do."
HUMAN DIGNITY
The Business Improvement District's bathroom committee has yet to officially meet, and Stratton says the City Council will want to wait to see more data and community input. Still, Morrison says she's excited about the partnership. Richard says that later this year, the Downtown Spokane Partnership is planning a comprehensive survey of the bathroom policies used by various downtown businesses."This is just the beginning, but I think there's a strong opening here," Stratton says. "I think you kind of just know when it's time to start bringing it up and talking about it. Now's the time."
Stratton and others hope that framing the bathroom conversation as a broader public infrastructure issue can help convince skeptics, but the brunt of the shortage still falls on unhoused people who don't have anywhere else to go.
In Spokane, 30 people have been issued citations for urinating or defecating in public since February 2020, according to municipal court records. Of those 30, five had previously been cited for camping or sitting on sidewalks.
Hallenburg says it's ultimately a matter of human dignity.
"I think it's dehumanizing to make people go to the bathroom in the streets. I think it's a terrible thing to do. Everybody should have access to a restroom," Hallenberg said.
For Luke, a homeless man standing on the corner of Second and Monroe twirling a cardboard sign in the air, the lack of public facilities presents a serious challenge. He says it's often impossible to find places that are open and that going outdoors is sometimes the only option.
"Somebody needs to care. I mean, it doesn't take a homeless guy to be mad about it, I'm surprised more kids or parents [aren't] mad about it," Luke says. ♦
