King County will spend $100,000 to reunite people with family or friends in other states

King County officials declared an emergency over homelessness four years ago, and yet the number of people without housing remains at record levels.

To help some of those people, the county will start paying for bus passes to get them back with family.

The County Council approved the money and specified that it can go toward bus passes or other reunification tools in their 2019-2021 supplemental budget.

"If you were a person that is homeless on the streets of King County somewhere, and you could stabilize your life by going home... I think it makes sense to have a relatively small program that helps people to do that," said Councilmember Claudia Balducci from Bellevue.

She said the bus passes out of town could be one small part of the solution.