Community organization helps support Walmart encampment residents, clean up site
Hanah Warthan has been out to the encampment behind Walmart in Bellingham seven times over the past several months.
She and her family hand out warm meals, snacks, tents, jackets, overdose kits with naloxone (Narcan) and brochures with community resources to the people living there. On one occasion, Warthan served pizza to more than 100 people there. On another, she hosted a chili feed. Warthan even served warm turkey soup to residents on Thanksgiving.
On Friday, she made hot cocoa and handed out trash bags to residents, asking them to help clean up the entrance to the encampment.
About 15 people spent the afternoon filling shopping carts with garbage and wheeling them to the street, where they will be picked up and disposed of. Residents at the camp told The Herald they are grateful for everything Warthan has done for them.
Mission for Missy
Warthan is doing all of this through her organization, Mission for Missy, which she started about two months ago and named after her son’s girlfriend, who died from a fentanyl overdose. Warthan is in the process of registering the organization as a nonprofit.
“If we can even save one life, it would be worth it to our family because of the loss we had to endure with Missy,” Warthan said. “She was just a baby. She did not deserve to die from this evil drug.”
The organization’s mission statement is “Fentanyl kills, Jesus Saves.” Warthan said the goal is to spread awareness about the dangers of fentanyl and to show love, kindness and understanding to people experiencing homelessness.
Warthan said she is spending most of her time at the encampment behind Walmart because of its size and the number of overdose deaths there.
“I fear that fentanyl is not going away any time soon,” Warthan said. “This drug kills. It terrifies me.”
Overdose deaths on the rise
The number of overdose deaths continues to increase in Whatcom County, the Lummi Nation, and across the state of Washington.
In September, the Lummi Indian Business Council (LIBC) declared a state of emergency in response to the fentanyl crisis. The Whatcom County Council approved a resolution supporting the declaration in October.
There have been 117 overdose-related deaths to date in Whatcom County in 2023, compared to 91 in 2022.
Native American communities have the second-highest overdose rate behind African Americans — nearly 40% higher than the rest of the nation, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control. Advocates say many factors are behind this, including lack of access to health care due to geographic isolation and generational trauma.
Many of the people living in the encampment behind Walmart are Lummi Nation members. Warthan said the Lummi Nation has helped provide many of the resources she hands out to people, including overdose kits.
Connecting with lived experience
Sharayah, a community member who came to volunteer during Friday’s cleanup with Mission for Missy, said it’s Warthan’s and Quinn’s unique history that helps them connect with people in the encampment to make a difference in their lives.
“It’s not just a client relationship. It’s family,” Sharayah said. “It’s coming from lived experience, and it’s a BIPOC-led organization. They can talk with them on a different level.”
Warthan herself experienced homelessness and spent time incarcerated. She lost her father to a drug overdose when she was a child.
Warthan’s son, Adrian Quinn, used to use fentanyl and was brought back from an overdose. But Quinn got clean after his girlfriend’s death and now helps Warthan in their mission to serve people experiencing homelessness.
“The mission is to show them that the community still cares about them,” Quinn said. “They just need the extra push to go to detox.”
Quinn said it’s rewarding to connect with people and help them meet some of their basic needs. But it can also be challenging.
“It’s hard for me to come out here because I used to be out here on the other side of it,” Quinn said. “I lived this.”
But Quinn said Missy would be proud of the work they are doing.
“She would be out here helping for sure. She cared about people she didn’t even know,” Quinn said.
This story was originally published January 2, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
