Community Government Health & Wellness

Safe parking spaces available soon for families living in their vehicles

Posted on October 9th, 2025 By: Conor Wilson

Filled with worries about political and economic uncertainty ahead, Patricia Grenseman and other congregants of St. John’s Episcopal Church started wondering what to do. They felt frozen.

Grenseman, who has attended the church for 14 years, said members of the congregation wanted to find something they could do locally to make a difference amid national turbulence. They wanted to live up to their church’s mottos: “Be like Jesus” and “Choose love.”

After a meeting of local faith-based groups and nonprofits last spring, they had their answer: Safe parking.

Safe parking spaces available soon

Starting as soon as this month, the church will open three parking spaces at which families with children living in their vehicle can park overnight. They hope to offer a lifeline to unhoused families in a community with few areas they can legally stay overnight.

Family Promise of Puget Sound, a nonprofit out of Parkland, will support the church in administering the site, screening families and assigning them a case manager to help with housing placement and employment. Cars can use the parking lot from 6 p.m. to 7 a.m. each day. RVs and tents are prohibited.

Three spaces may not sound like much, but it could meet an outsized need in Gig Harbor, said Family Promise CEO Steve Decker. The city and the Key Peninsula have few resources for people facing homelessness. Often, they need to travel into Tacoma or across the county line to Kitsap for services.

“I don’t want to see them wasting their gas driving back and forth across the bridge or up and down to Port Orchard to try and get their kids placed,” Decker said. “If we can keep their family and friends and support for the kids close, that’s the goal.”

St. John’s Episcopal Church plans to open three parking spaces at which families with children living in their vehicle can park overnight. Photo by Conor Wilson

Intake hub

All individuals seeking emergency shelter in Pierce County are routed through Family Promise. The agency set up Pierce County’s first ever centralized intake hub last year, The News Tribune reported.

The 24/7 service connects individuals in the county with a provider who best meets their needs. In the last year, Decker said, Family Promise has processed more than 3,000 intake forms and been responsible for placing people in shelters across the county.

Family Promise announced this month it will expand operations into Kitsap, Mason, Thurston and King counties after receiving a $400,000 state grant. The nonprofit will partner with faith-based organizations to provide safe shelter space and support for families.

Decker said a Google Grant helped them build a system that can rapidly search available housing options. The agency boasts in a press release that its model can place families into permanent shelter 140% faster than typical programs. It reduces their times in emergency shelter by 60%.

Twelve families with children from Gig Harbor have already reached out to Family Promise about emergency shelter, Decker said. About half were single parents escaping domestic violence.

Homeless students

Estimating how many families with children may be homelessness in Gig Harbor is difficult.

Beck Maffei, a counselor for Peninsula Schools, said the district identified 178 students as homeless under the McKinney Vento Act, a 1987 federal law that requires districts to annually report students experiencing homelessness.

The legislation defines homeless to includes children sleeping outside, in cars or in shelters, youth living on their own and those who are “doubling up,” meaning they are staying with someone due to a lack of housing.

Statewide, about 48,500 students were homeless during the 2023-24 school year, according to the state superintendent’s office. About three-quarters of these students were doubled-up and about 8% were unsheltered, which includes sleeping in a vehicle.

Getting families and their children into shelter is extremely difficult. The vast majority of emergency housing does not support families.

“It’s impossible to place families,” Decker said.

Right now, more than 140 Pierce County families are waiting for emergency shelter, Decker said. That is about 300 children.

Few local options

The sparse availability of nearby shelter options and high housing costs can add to placement challenges for Gig Harbor and Key Peninsula families. Those facing homelessness may need to go elsewhere, like Tacoma, to find housing.

Moving to a new area, even if it is only a city away, often means leaving behind established relationships and support systems. That can be daunting for anyone — especially for children.

“When you talk about families and children that experience homelessness, the single greatest issue is the trauma that kids are experiencing,” Decker said.

Losing a home and sleeping outside on their own is distressing for children, which can result in worse academic performances. Moving and changing schools, stripping students of the friendships they have built or the rapport they have with teachers, makes it harder for them to build resilience in the face of life-altering trauma, Decker said.

City officials support safe parking site

That is why city officials support the safe parking site at St. John’s.

“These families are already in our community,” Gig Harbor Mayor Mary Barber said at a city meeting. “This is helping keep families whose children are going to school in the Peninsula School District in their home school.”

Safe parking sites are generally not publicized, said Shea Smiley, housing, health and human services manager for the city, which is not involved with the safe park project. They often provide refuge for individuals fleeing domestic violence.

Notification was required by a state law passed in 2020. The legislation aimed to limit cities or counties’ ability to restrict safe parking or temporary encampments on property owned by religious organizations. Before passage, an amendment added a requirement for notice and hosting a public meeting.

No pushback

St. Johns has not heard any pushback from the community, Grenseman said. She hopes it stays that way. Families struggling and living unhoused need a lot of support, she said, but “one thing they don’t need is more shame and guilt.”

Patricia Grenseman at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Gig Harbor on Sept. 24, 2025. Photo by Conor Wilson

As the first public safe park in the city, the church feels some pressure. The first of something often sets the tone, she says, noting the church and its members are working hard to make sure everything runs smoothly.

Grenseman said it can be easy to fall back on stereotypes. But she emphasized that homeless families are “our neighbors,” and it’s time for the community to start taking care of its residents, rather than making them leave when they need help.

“We want to be able to say we can look after you here in town,” she said.

Families or individuals facing homelessness and in need of emergency shelter can call Family Promise of Puget Sound at (253) 444-4563 to complete an intake form.