It’s not every day that efforts to help society’s most challenging problems come to fruition, let alone address multiple issues simultaneously. Robin Tatsuda BA’02 and Jordan Rash BA’06, however, are achieving just that as members of a project to construct the Mercy Angle Lake Housing Project, a development in Seattle with affordable housing, meaningful support for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDDs), and access to public transit via an innovative collaboration between Sound Transit, Mercy Housing Northwest, and The Arc of King County.
“Willamette’s motto, ‘Not alone unto ourselves are we born’ is a mindset embedded in me through my education,” shares Tatsuda, who is the Executive Director of The Arc of King County. This non-profit organization assists the community of 36,000 individuals living with IDDs and their families in Washington’s King County. Their latest and most pressing issue is Seattle’s housing crisis.
“When I started at The Arc twelve years ago, housing was not on our radar. Then a tiny trickle turned into a stream, and now it’s a tsunami of people with IDDs and their families who are homeless or on the brink of it,” she says. “We realized if the system isn't solving this problem for us, we need to solve it ourselves.”
Like Tatsuda, Rash was committed to taking part in large-scale social impact and pursued his dream of working in conservation. As Senior Project Manager for Transit-Oriented Development for Sound Transit, Rash looks for ways to increase access to public transit. He solicits proposals for affordable housing projects on land left over from construction projects, which are sold to qualifying entities way below market price.
“I was looking over the project team members to see if there were any Willamette alumni,” says Rash. “Seeing Robin involved made me feel at ease knowing our shared experience and that the Willamette motto would help guide both of us to bring this community-oriented project to fruition.”
Part of the Angle Lake light rail station is being repurposed to house 130 families earning between 30% and 80% of the area's median income and is expected to be completed by mid-2025. Many of the units will be reserved for tenants with IDDs who will benefit from The Arc of King County’s support on the ground floor.
“The idea of having The Arc offices in the building is an emerging concept. People with disabilities not only need bricks and mortar; there is also an ecosystem of support that folks need to be successful and stable,” says Tatsuda.
As the first project of its kind in Washington state, the Mercy Angle Lake Housing Project has garnered attention from other cities interested in replicating it. For Tatsuda and Rash, the collaboration represents a homecoming to the values instilled during their time at Willamette.
