KING COUNTY, Wash. — A citizen’s group that cleans up drug needles they say are handed out by King County workers as a harm-reduction strategy is becoming a growing problem.
In Federal Way, they say piles of used drug needles are scattered throughout the city, and any plans to clean up the giant mess cannot keep up.
At a park-and-ride where workers hand out needles and where nearby homeless encampments are located, a KIRO 7 crew saw an incredible amount of used needles scattered about.
On Friday, a group of concerned organized neighbors in Federal Way shared an astonishing photo showing thousands of used needles they gathered from what they call “drug camps” across their city.
“I would like to actually start to call it what it is... this isn’t a homeless problem. This is a drug addiction problem,” Ken Blevins, who leads Stand Up Federal Way, said.
Blevins met up with the KIRO 7 crew and led them through an opening in the fence of a park-and-ride to one of the trails where people stream in and out throughout the day. The crew could not take a single step without finding a needle on the ground.
“Twelve, 13, 14, 15 -- needles, right on a trail, and these weren’t here before. These are new needles that were tossed on the ground,” Blevins said.
He says there are several areas in wooded county property filled with human waste and needles.
The KIRO 7 crew came across an area that was just steps away from a protected watershed.
“Right over here we found like 300 of them in just like an area like this,” Blevins said.
KIRO 7 reporter asks, “300 needles?”
“I’m not kidding, it was crazy. They were in the bush. They just take them and throw them into the bush,” Blevins said.
In a parking lot near all of the needles KIRO 7 saw, a King County van representing the Harm Reduction Progam was offering a needle exchange in packages of 10, which the crew also saw on the trail.
“They’re giving them things to actually throw into our wetlands and not coming back and cleaning it up, and have a systemic way of getting these people through the system, but not just toss em out at the end,” Blevins said.
“As citizens, we aren’t going to take it anymore,” Suzanne Vargo, also with Stand Up, said.
Vargo says the needles, along with human waste and an incredible amount of trash, affect a sensitive watershed connected to streams where salmon spawn.
“Right over here, you can even see there’s drugs in it, still,” she said. “So it’s one big connected system, and they do irreparable damage that cannot be fixed in our lifetime for these wetlands.”
Federal Way Mayor Jim Ferrell says he asked Seattle & King County Public Health to pause the needle handouts for a few months, but that request was denied.
Ferrell says there is a plan in motion to clean up the mess, but as you can see, keeping up with the number of people using is a daily issue.