Downtown Spokane salon closes doors, citing Catholic Charities housing and crime

The owner of a downtown Spokane salon has elected to close her doors permanently because of the proliferation of crime in the area.

Linda Biel, the co-owner of Urbanna Natural Spa, Salon and Wine, said the abundance of crime in the region has been fostered by the presence of seven Catholic Charities low-income housing facilities within a six-block radius of her salon and the unruly crowds those apartments attract.

Biel noted many vulnerable people are living in those facilities and are making noble attempts to get off the streets and find more concrete living situations. However, drug dealers and other individuals who don't live there often flock around those buildings and prey on people trying to get their life back in order. She called the nearby 7-Eleven convenience mart the hub for such nefarious activity.

Described as a premier wellness spa, Biel's business has been in the same spot since 2016. Before that, her business was about 500 feet south of its current location, but still along South Division Street. When she moved to the current location next to the train tracks, she said only two Catholic Charity facilities were in the area. Today, there are seven.

Built toward the end of 2019, the Beatriz and Ed Schweitzer Haven sits across the street from Urbanna. When Biel first moved, it was an empty lot.

"When we moved down here, we were truly in search of peace and quiet and safety," Biel said. "And if you look at our little area, it's kind of like a little niche, just a little nook. But then, when they put that there, everything changed."

The people congregating around the area have caused a number of Biel's employees to quit and clients to take their business elsewhere. Biel said she and her employees have seen individuals expose themselves in their entrance, defecate in their parking lot, shoot up drugs along the sidewalk and scream curse words at them. The salon has been robbed at gunpoint and once, windows into a room built for youth haircuts were struck by seven bullets.

Urbanna is in a building built in 1907 that was once home to the Inland Empire Biscuit Bakery. Biel said she has spent tens of thousands of dollars refurbishing and converting the building into a destination spa and salon. With no plans to relocate, she's saying goodbye to all 33 of her employees and numerous clients when they close for good on July 15.

Biel said in 2018 they had over 17,000 clients in their database, although many of them were not regular customers. This year, she sent emails out about promotions and deals to just 4,000 customers.

"The whole downtown is tainted," Biel said. "And we're the hot spot, we're the reason."

Biel filed a lawsuit against the City of Spokane and Catholic Charities last year, alleging the two have not done enough to deter crime in the area. The lawsuit alleges that the seven transitional housing facilities are "chronic nuisances that must be mitigated." The lawsuit, which asks for $3.4 million in damages, is currently pending in Spokane County Superior Court.

Given the ongoing legal battle, Dave Meany, the director of communications for Catholic Charities Eastern Washington, said the nonprofit declined to comment other than issue an update to a previous statement made last August.

"We are confident that the litigation process will reveal that the spa, salon, and wine bar's closure is not a result of any activity on Catholic Charities' property and/or any conduct attributable to our residents, who are striving to improve their lives," the statement read.

The statement also said Catholic Charities officials are disappointed that Urbanna's ownership feels that the poor and vulnerable are a nuisance. The organization's statement noted Biel's lawyer submitted several misleading, inaccurate and baseless allegations.

According to its website, Catholic Charities invests more than $1 million per year on safety and security in and around the facilities, including for security personnel, access control, and surveillance camera systems.

Within that same August statement regarding Biel's lawsuit, Catholic Charities' CEO and President Robert McCann wrote: "The facts and Jesus are on our side. Catholic Charities Eastern Washington will not waver from this work. Love always wins."

"I would say, if you're on God's side, then why aren't you taking care of the people that you're contracted to take care of?" Biel told a Spokesman-Review reporter in response.

Biel claims that the conditions inside many of the Catholic Charities facilities are problematic. She provided a report of noncompliance from the Washington State Housing Finance Commission for the Father Bach Haven facility, dated December 2023, which listed numerous violations of inspection standards such as the prevalence of graffiti, inoperable smoke alarms, refrigerators that don't maintain adequate temperatures, and other issues.

One long-term client of Biel's is Spokane Mayor Lisa Brown, who said she is sorry to hear that Urbanna is closing.

"There is a concentration of affordable housing there," Brown said. "All of that predates my administration. All of the decisions to locate things there are part of previous city decisions and nonprofit decisions. Since I've been in office, we have worked to address, to the extent possible, when it came to things we had control over."

While that specific corridor is challenging, Brown said the city has taken a variety of actions. She said they moved the Compassionate Addiction Treatment center recently, worked to get mobile treatment services and affordable housing up and running, have been in dialogue with the owners of 7-Eleven about security and have seen success with the passing of the Safe and Accessible Spaces ordinance.

"Data shows it's getting better," she said.

Kurtis Reese, the captain of the downtown precinct for the Spokane Police Department, said crime downtown, year over year, is down. Depending on where you are, he said, that can feel both true and untrue.

"The crime trends and kind of the groups of people move," Reese said. "So you might have a concentration, let's say at State and Pacific, for a period of a couple days. We deal with that, and we address some of the things that are going on, and then the groups will move to 7-Eleven."

He said it's not uncommon to see drug dealers and other criminals prey on vulnerable populations that live in low-income housing.

"We do our best to deal with the unhoused population, try to help them get into services, while also trying to protect them from those predatory groups," he said.

According to the police department's Crisis Outreach Response and Engagement report, there were approximately 6,200 arrests around the Second and Division corridor near downtown between 2024 and 2025. And according to the Spokane Police Department, 24 people were responsible for 34% of the crime.

Recent changes the police have enacted in that area include redirecting the homeless population from waiting for beds at night outside of the House of Charity and transporting them to the navigation center instead. Reese said officers patrol the area hourly and, through the Safe and Accessible Spaces Ordinance, try ensure the sidewalk is clear and that no one is sleeping or camping on the sidewalk.

"We didn't get to this point overnight," Reese said. "And it was a lot of systemic stuff that has caused the issues over the past couple years. We saw some very low lows. I believe that we are on the upswing for a lot of positive things that are going on, and it's not going to just be fixed overnight."

Copyright 2026 Tribune Content Agency. All Rights Reserved.

This story was originally published June 2, 2026 at 7:18 PM.