Steady funding to end homelessness

Establishing an annual General Fund base amount to end homelessness, rather than relying on one-time appropriations, is the goal of Rep. Jeff Hayden (DFL-Mpls), sponsor of HF1491.

The bill would designate $5.35 million during the 2010-2011 biennium to address homelessness throughout Minnesota and each biennium thereafter.

“All of these programs could use funds beyond this amount to serve our most vulnerable population. This bill just sets the floor so Minnesota’s homeless don’t have the rug pulled out from under them,” Hayden told the House Housing Finance and Policy and Public Health Finance Division March 24. The bill was held over for possible omnibus bill inclusion. There is no Senate companion.

Beginning July 1, 2009, $1 million would be appropriated annually for the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act to help provide shelter or housing for children during “crucial moments of their development,” said Kirsten Anderson-Stembridge, policy coordinator for Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota. A 2007 appropriation of the same amount served 7,067 children.

Another $3 million would be added to the base appropriation for programs that address long-term homelessness. Some of the recipients need help for up to 10 years to overcome the effects of mental illness, drug or alcohol abuse, joblessness and other factors related to homelessness.

Beginning in fiscal year 2010, the bill would appropriate $750,000 for transitional housing programs and another $600,000 for emergency services grants. Both amounts would be added to future base appropriations.

Currently the state spends about $13 million on homelessness issues. Advocates said thousands are turned away each night due to lack of facilities, and 134 homeless people died last year, according to Sue Watlov Phillips, executive director of Elim Transitional Housing.

“We are spending more on data collection than we are on shelter in the state of Minnesota with the governor’s proposed budget. We need good data, but we cannot be spending more money collecting data about homeless people than sheltering people that are experiencing homelessness,” Phillips said.