City of Bellingham moves against owner of land that is site of homeless encampment

Bellingham officials are taking steps toward ousting residents in an encampment housing hundreds of homeless people behind the Walmart, where widespread drug use, violence and deaths has been reported over several years.

In a unanimous vote Monday night, the City Council approved filing of a “nuisance abatement action” against the owner of the property at 298 E. Stuart Road. This comes after months of pushback at City Council meetings from residents living next door to the encampment expressing fear for their safety.

Monday’s action will “place a lien on the city’s cost to abate the nuisance and foreclose upon the lien if necessary,” Council President Dan Hammill said.

Councilwoman Lisa Anderson spelled out the situation after Monday’s vote.

“It’s the property behind Walmart. I just wanted to make that clarification and that the city is moving forward with legal action on that property owner,” Anderson said.

Anderson told The Bellingham Herald in a phone interview that the situation has been “frustrating” for the city.

“I think it’s important for the community to know that the city is now moving forward. It looks as though we need to move it to the next level. It’s festered to the point that it’s become an environmental and health hazard,” Anderson said.

According to the Whatcom County Assessor’s Office website, the undeveloped site is owned by Li-Ching Fang of Chunan Miaoli, Taiwan, a township on the coast south of Taipei.

Fang bought the 20-acre property for $460,000 in 2019.

Janice Keller, the city’s acting deputy administrator and communications director, said more details will be available when court papers are filed.

“A city team has been involved for some time in addressing the illegal encampment on the 20-acre property at the corner of East Stuart and Deemer roads. Various steps have been taken to compel the property owner to clean up and bring the property into compliance, most recent being City Council’s approval on Feb. 12 to file an action in court,” Keller told The Herald in an email.

In late 2022 the city of Bellingham sued another local property owner who officials said was causing a public nuisance by not removing a large encampment on the land at 4049 Deemer Road behind WinCo in north Bellingham. The city determined the property to be unsafe, in violation of the state’s public health code and detrimental to neighboring businesses and the public because it was overrun with garbage, waste, rodents and non-operating motor vehicles, according to court documents.

The WinCo encampment was cleared in May of 2023 after the city settled with the property owner. About 40-60 people were believed to have been living in the encampment.

The process of suing the property owner and eventually clearing the Winco property took more than half a year.

City Attorney Alan Marriner previously told city council members that clearing the encampment behind Walmart would take much longer due to the wooded nature of the site and its size.

Meanwhile, homeless advocates are calling for more shelter availability and available resources. Many say clearing the encampment without the appropriate resources will just push people in the encampment to other locations around the city without solving the problem.

The removal of a homeless encampment at City Hall in January 2021 drew an angry protest and resulted in several arrests.