The nonprofit Downtown Emergency Service Center got its start in 1979 running a homeless shelter in the second-story ballroom of the Morrison Hotel on the border of Pioneer Square and Downtown.
Seattle’s homeless residents could spend a night there, receiving a hot meal and sleeping on one of the 200 mats on the floor. DESC used the space as its main overnight shelter for 40 years and later opened 190 units of permanent supportive housing on the upper floors.
Then the COVID-19 pandemic led to the shelter’s closure as homelessness providers realized they could not safely keep people in crowded indoor shared spaces…