A Major Setback
Early this year our congress could not agree (what else is
new?) on budget issues and allowed a self-imposed mandate go into effect. The
mandate’s original purpose was to compel congress themselves to come to some
sort of compromise regarding this country’s budget. Well as we have seen they
could not agree for all sorts of reasons. Reasons I will not comment on here.
What I will comment on here are some of the results of that failure to act that
affect the homeless community in this city and this country.
A few weeks ago I heard a news report from a national news
source regarding homeless housing in Minnesota. What happened was 10 or 15
people were approved for subsidized housing and were in the process of finding
a suitable apartment when their funding was cut and those people, who have gone
all through the process were basically told “sorry” and for the foreseeable
future are back on the street. Now keep in mind that those people were
“approved” and then not approved. Add to that all the people in the pipeline
who not only will have to wait to qualify but will have to wait in living
situations they are trying to get out of.
Consider this. Many homeless shelters here in Ft Worth as is
the case all over the country rely on federal grants and other federal funding
sources to help provide services to the homeless with the goal of getting that
homeless person off the street. Services such as job training or retraining,
GED classes, housing assistance, medical assistance and just about every other
service provided to the homeless community. The result is a return to a
situation in the homeless community such as we had 6 or 8 years ago. Shelters
will only be able to provide basic services such as a bed and maybe food. Not
much else. Overcrowding will start taking place. The number of homeless people not
able to get into the shelter or other safe place will rise. As a result, the
number of people living on the street will rise. Drug and alcohol abuse will
rise. Prostitution will rise. Crime in general involving homeless people as a
perpetrator and as a victim will rise.
Basically there will be a return to conditions that existed
here and elsewhere 6, 8 or 10 years ago. Conditions where a ride down Lancaster
was like a shopping trip for drugs or sex or almost any other thing you may
want. Ok, so the city will say they will not allow that to happen to Lancaster
Ave. but mark my words, it will happen. The police will take the brunt of the
heat to keep crime in the area down and will not be able to keep up. Remember
the police get some federal funding too. And with that said the problems will
just snowball. Progress in the homeless situation will be setback many years.
Try this one on for size. Many people released from prison used
to end up on the street and in the shelters. Federal programs which are now
suffering severe cutbacks used to be able to help those people return to
society. With the elimination or cutbacks in funding, they will have no other
choice but to return to their old life with all those concerns to the community
as a whole.
Similar situations are happening all over the country.
Because federal funding is necessary in the battle against homelessness, the
battle took a big hit. Homelessness is not simple and there is no easy fix.
When funding is removed a return to more basic services is inevitable and with
that a return to a situation that existed 6 or 8 years ago will be inevitable.
Funding is key to the homeless situation. While not the whole problem, Congress
and our federal government is part of all this and their inaction will cause a
snowball effect that will return the homeless community back to a pre-2005
level. I was there, I saw it and it was not pretty.
