ARLINGTON - The $500,000
Arlington home features a double staircase, six bedrooms and a game
room complete with a foosball table. Brand new, the large yellow
house is tucked in a pleasant residential area near Smokey Point.
It looks lovely.
But for the teens who live here, it
will be a last resort. They'll arrive exhausted, emotionally drained
and ready to give up on life. Some will be victims of abuse. Many
will be poor. Almost all will long for a way out of homelessness,
said Laura Zavala, Cocoon House's director of residential services.
Like its predecessor in Everett,
Arlington's Cocoon House will be a place of last chances. It will be
all that separates its residents from the streets.
And if Everett's Cocoon House is
any bellwether, the teen shelter will be full.
On an average day, 300 homeless
kids between the ages of 13 and 17 roam Snohomish County, Zavala
said. They sleep on friends' couches, in hotels and in alleys. They
sleep in Arlington, in Monroe and in tiny rural communities.
Homelessness is not just a problem for Everett anymore, Zavala said.
"There's a lot of homeless kids in
some of the distant parts of the county who aren't accessing the
services because they've had bad experiences with adults," she said.
"So there are teens sleeping on the street or in campgrounds or
under bridges."
That's why Cocoon House is opening
a new shelter in Arlington.
The Everett branch has eightbeds
that are rarely empty. In the last five years, the number of teens
seeking temporary shelter has shot up, as has the number of teens
the shelter turns away due to lack of space.
In 2001, the nonprofit
organization's leadership team decided to start planning for a new
shelter.
"That year we had to turn 100 teens
away, which was a shock for the agency," Development Director Cassie
Davison said. "It was way more than we had experienced in the past.
And now we're over 200 a year."
The new shelter will primarily
serve kids in northern Snohomish County. Dozens of new housing
developments have sprouted up in the area in recent years,
attracting more families with children. Some will wind up homeless.
Many of these kids have grown up in
the shadow of the Cascades or on sprawling farms and are terrified
at the thought of staying at a shelter in Everett.
"It's scary," Davison said. "It's
the big city. They don't want to leave their support systems - their
coach, maybe their best friend or their church."
At the Arlington shelter, full-time
house parents Fred and Rhonda Paul expect to watch over the teens to
make sure they attend school and follow the rules. If residents come
home drunk or after the 5 p.m. weekday curfew without a decent
excuse, they'll be kicked out.
Drug, alcohol and mental health
counselors will visit. Staff members are expected to call the teens'
parents or guardian to get permission for them to stay. They'll also
talk about the issues that lead to homelessness and try to develop a
long-term plan for the teens.
Since Cocoon House is a temporary
shelter, its residents are constantly changing. On average, the
teens who use the Everett house seek shelter there 12 days a year.
Eighty-five percent leave the
shelter for what Davison described as "positive" places -their
family home, a relative's house or full-time transitional housing.
The kids who will go to Cocoon
House in Arlington won't want to go there.
And if all goes according to plan,
they won't have to again.
How to get help
If you are 13 to 17 years old and
need a place to sleep, call the Cocoon House shelter at 800-259-6042
or 425-259-6042. You can also e-mail the shelter at shelter@cocoonhouse.org.
For more information, on Cocoon
House go to www.cocoonhouse.org.
