Near Seattle's Space Needle, some of the city's homeless have set up camp in a "mansion" made of tents, chairs, tarps, and other odds and ends and are thumbing their noses at local politicians.
"If you can live on the street and not pay rent, then why would you pay rent?" Melissa Burns told Q13 News.
What makes homeless camp unique is its location: It sits on a pleasant grassy knoll surrounded by multimillion-dollar high-rise condominiums.
"It is a form of protest," Burns, one of the "mansion" dwellers, told Q13. "We're staking a claim. We're refusing to cower in our tents."
Burns took up residence at the camp after city authorities forced her to give up her previous digs at a local park.
"We've got the doors, the couch, the table," she said. "We've got the living room here, which is a mess right now because we're still constructing, but we're putting up the vinyl to cover it up, make it more attractive."
Burns concedes that the “mansion” is a “disaster” constructed of anything they can find. She added that local reaction is mixed.
"Some people are cheering us on, and some people are really angry about it," she told Q13.
The city has no immediate plans to remove the homeless camp, but that could change in the event of future problems or safety concerns, according to City of Seattle spokesman Will Lemke.
"It's certainly an eyesore. But I don't think they have a lot of options," nearby worker Lou Bequette told Q13 News. "So, I guess they gotta do what they gotta do."
The Emerald City has been trying to deal with a mushrooming homeless problem since 2015, which prompted former Mayor Ed Murray to declare a “state of emergency.”
Folks on social media blamed the homeless crisis on liberal politicians.
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