When President Barack Obama released his fiscal year 2014 budget proposal in April, John Lozier, executive director of the National Health Care for the Homeless Council (NHCHC), became immediately concerned that not enough is being done at the federal level to resolve the on-going homelessness epidemic.
"You just can't stay well without housing, which is why this budget is a step in the wrong direction," he said.
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While the president's budget includes policies that will improve the stability and health of the homeless population and other vulnerable individuals and families, along with an increase in the minimum wage, investments in the mental health workforce, and a reversal of the sequester, Lozier believes those initiatives and the proposed budget will allow the drivers of homelessness to persist.
"While we appreciate the political realities, it is still disappointing a greater vision for addressing poverty and homelessness was not articulated," said Lozier. "At a time when unemployment is high, wages are stagnating, and worst-case housing needs have risen to historic levels, this business-as-usual budget just does not go far enough."
Barbara DiPietro, director of policy for the NHCHC, said that while the NHCHC appreciates the investments made in the healthcare budget, "more investments in housing would make it more effective. We see housing as healthcare. The budget includes increases for mental health and substance abuse and investments in the (affordable care act) – which is great – but those increases fail to keep up with the losses we've sustained in housing. We hate to see the failures on one end of the budget compromise other areas of the budget."
She added that with 1.6 million peo ple using emergency shelters in a given year, 8.5 million fami lies facing worst-case housings needs (a 44 percent increase over the last five years), and 30 million people projected to remain uninsured after the ACA goes into full effect, the efforts made in the latest budget proposal may be enough to keep a number of vulnerable people in their homes or prevent addition- al homelessness, "but it's not a budget that gets people currently without homes into homes."
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Only a reversal of the "decades-long federal disinvestment in low-income housing and support services will address the pressing needs" going on within the home- less population, she said.
Dan Rabbitt, health policy organizer for the NHCHC, echoed his colleague, noting that the president's budget is not a "game-changer." "It maintains the path we are on," he said, "which is on a downward trend."
In contrast, Carly Stewart, medical expert at Money Crashers Personal Finance, thinks that the proposed 2014 budget does sufficiently address poverty and homelessness.
"The proposal includes over 20 percent more funds directed towards homelessness than the budget from two years ago. Furthermore, it includes significant funding for healthcare for the homeless through the Department of Health and Human Services, grants for homelessness assistance and increased funding for the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Obama's plan also replaces the sequester cuts, which have seriously impacted many programs dealing with homelessness and poverty," she said.
Stewart added that while it's still uncertain whether the budget will pass Congress or not, "it seems as though his proposal remains in line with his Opening Doors program, launched in 2010, to put an end to homelessness. Its stated goal is to end all forms of homelessness by 2020. The funds he allocates in his budget proposal would seem to keep achieving this goal on target. It would be great to direct even more funds to homeless ness and poverty, but until we get our debt reduced, there just isn't going to be enough money to go around."
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