Seattle-area housing provider’s water cutoffs go too far, residents say

BURIEN, Wash. – A system meant to prevent excessive water use has frequently malfunctioned at a Burien supportive housing complex, residents say, leaving them without access to drinking water, showers and working toilets for up to a day at a time.

But, to the nonprofit that owns the housing, the cost-saving technology is still worth implementing in its buildings as financial challenges for the affordable housing industry mount.

“The idea here of having a safety net … is something that is really important for us to explore to make permanent supportive housing and the people we serve sustainable over the long haul,” said Noah Fay, the senior director of housing programs at Downtown Emergency Service Center, the nonprofit that operates the Burien housing complex.

Other Seattle-area housing nonprofits are also considering using the automatic water shut-off system.

To some nonprofit leaders, it’s a promising new technology as Washington cities push forward with building more permanent supportive housing. (Permanent supportive housing is designed for people experiencing chronic homelessness or those with disabilities, typically has rents capped at 30% of a household’s income, and includes case management services).

But to residents of the Burien housing complex called Bloomside, the idea of more supportive housing using the system is frightening. They say they feel like unwilling participants in an industrywide experiment.

“This is ridiculous. They’ve gone way too far with this stuff,” said Brian O’Reilly, 57, who said he alerted a DESC staff member when his water shut off late last year.

“They said, ‘You must have used too much water.’ I said, ‘What do you mean?’ ” O’Reilly said. “I wasn’t able to flush the toilet. I wasn’t able to take a shower until the next day. I wasn’t able to brush my teeth.”

Some Bloomside residents say the system hasn’t worked properly since the building opened in May 2024. Residents said they’ve been in the middle of showering when the water shuts off and had to cope by buying water or using their neighbor’s toilet.

That’s not how the system is meant to work, Fay said. Staff members are supposed to turn the water back on after receiving an alert; the water should turn back on automatically after 90 minutes.

Despite complaints to the city of Burien and a state law banning landlords from intentionally shutting off their tenants’ utilities, residents continued to experience water shut-offs up until DESC turned off the system a few months ago.

“Knowing the fact that there’s disabled people living here … you would think that that would be the last place they’d try and do that,” O’Reilly said.

‘We’re still learning’

DESC, which provides permanent supportive housing, shelter and services for people experiencing homelessness in the Seattle area, often has to respond to flooding caused by tenants, Fay said.

Some of DESC’s residents are “living with pretty profound disorganization,” he said, and unknowingly leave water running for long periods of time. Sometimes, residents with mental illness continuously run water on purpose to drown out auditory hallucinations, he said.

“They might not recognize it as the emergency it is, and by the time we’re able to intervene, damage has been done to their unit and others, which is super disruptive,” he said.

So DESC installed systems in Bloomside that are designed to temporarily shut off water to a unit when 60 gallons – equivalent to running a shower for around 30 minutes – are used over a period of time ranging from 90 minutes to three hours.

DESC staff are supposed to receive an alert that the water has shut off and come check to see if a unit has started to flood.

Fay said the building has experienced fewer floods compared with DESC’s 18 other locations since installing the shut-off valve.

“I think it’s a really super promising technology that is brand-spanking new for us,” he said.

But residents say the technology has made them afraid to use water. One resident with diabetes said he keeps jugs of water on hand and uses as little water as possible.

Fay said DESC turned off the shut-off system several months ago after a blackout prevented staff from receiving shut-off alerts. He was unaware of any other incidents where the system had malfunctioned.

“We are committed to serving this group without traditional landlord tools of eviction when water damage pops up,” he said. “Now, does that mean we’re still learning how to implement this stuff? Of course we’re still learning.”

Two residents invited the Seattle Times to see inside their homes, which also have automatic oven shut-off technology and speaker systems that allow building managers to contact residents. But Bloomside staff blocked the Times from entering, saying the residents were not allowed to have reporters visit their apartments. DESC didn’t respond to questions about the blocked visit.

Rising costs

Nonprofit housing providers are turning to monitoring equipment amid skyrocketing costs and fewer grant opportunities under the Trump administration, which plans to cut funds for permanent supportive housing by billions of dollars this year.

DESC, which is funded through a mix of public dollars, private donations and tenant rent, stands to lose about $20 million, or a quarter of its permanent supportive housing fund, from the planned cut.

At the same time, housing nonprofits are seeing more tenants fall behind on rent while the costs of labor, insurance, maintenance and utilities soar.

One company that advertises water shut-off systems for affordable housing on its website says it can reduce water and sewer costs by 10% to 20%, and cut insurance premium costs by up to 15%.

But the technology may not be legal in Washington.

A 1973 state law bans landlords from intentionally shutting off their tenants’ utility services, unless it’s for a reasonable period of time to make repairs. There is no carve-out for permanent supportive housing.

Tyler Graber, a staff attorney with the Northwest Justice Project who primarily works on landlord-tenant rights, said he doesn’t believe the water shut-off technology would fall in line with the law.

Fay, with DESC, disagrees.

“My response to that would be, services are only being interrupted because we’re being (informed) that necessary repairs are needed. That’s the point of the system,” he said.

DESC plans to install the technology in its future buildings.

O’Reilly, the resident, isn’t happy about that. He doesn’t want any other residents to experience their water shutting off as he did, and hopes to find another housing provider that doesn’t use the system.

“It seems like they’re using the former homeless as an experiment,” he said.