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Obama Administration Undermining Efforts to End Homelessness
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty today called on the Obama Administration to support and expand a critical federal law that helps to end homelessness. The Administration has proposed legislation that would effectively eliminate Title V of the McKinney-Vento Act, a law that provides housing and services to more than 2 million people per year, and is aggressively seeking to eliminate a court order that helps ensure compliance with the law.
Law Center Executive Director Maria Foscarinis said At a time when family homelessness has gone up 20% since 2007, the government ought to be doing more - not less - to match people without homes and homes without people. President Obama and his Administration can meet this challenge through an existing program - they should be promoting it, not seeking to eliminate it.
With family homelessness at an unprecedented level and the economy teetering on the edge of a double-dip recession, the Administration's efforts to eliminate Title V, a longstanding, low-cost program, seriously undermine the Administration's own promises to end homelessness in the next ten years. In June 2010, the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness released a federal strategic plan to end homelessness, asserting that no one should be without a safe, stable place to call home. In November 2010, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development agreed to take further measures to reduce America's homeless population as part of an overall strategy to address human rights issues. Despite this rhetoric, the Administration is now seeking, through various federal agencies, to eliminate the judicial decisions that ensure the government's compliance with Title V. Doing so would be an enormous setback for homeless people at a time when growing numbers of Americans need shelter and services.
Since the McKinney-Vento Act's passage in 1987, Title V has given qualified homeless service providers the legal right to receive suitable property that the federal government no longer uses, at no cost. The program links non-profit organizations and state and local governments in need of land or buildings with federal agencies seeking to divest themselves of unused, underused, or excess property. Over 500 properties have been conveyed to homeless service providers since Title V was passed.
In 1988, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia found that numerous federal agencies, including the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Housing & Urban Development, and Health and Human Services were neglecting their legal obligations under Title V. After successfully obtaining a permanent injunction against these agencies, the Law Center has brought these agencies back to court numerous times in the intervening decades in order to enforce the law, while simultaneously working with the Administration and Congress to improve the program.
As Foscarinis testified before the House of Representatives in July, "[t]his is not the time for Congress or the Administration to reverse its commitment to low-income Americans. Instead, Foscarinis said, we should look at every possible option for matching homeless people with currently unused housing units owned by the federal government.
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