Hunger and homelessness continued to rise at double-digit rates in 2003, according to a Dec. 18 report released by the U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM). In the 25 cities that responded to its survey, requests for emergency food assistance were up 17 percent over last the year, while requests for emergency shelter increased by 13 percent on average.
The report cites unemployment and other employment-related problems as the leading cause of hunger, debunking claims by Bush administration claims that an economic recovery is lifting workers out of poverty.
Other causes of hunger listed in the report include low-paying jobs, the high cost of housing, medical care costs, substance abuse and mental health problems, reduced public benefits, childcare costs, and transportation expenses.
The leading cause of homelessness is the lack of affordable housing, followed by the lack of needed services for mental health and substance abuse problems, low-paying jobs, unemployment, domestic violence, poverty and prison release.
Continuing the trend of recent years, more families with children as well as the working poor are seeking emergency assistance. Fully 59 percent of those turning to soup kitchens and food pantries this year were parents and their children, while 39 percent of the adults seeking food were unemployed.
The number of homeless families seeking shelter increased 15 percent in 2003, constituting 40 percent of the overall homeless population. In 15 of the 25 cities surveyed, families may have to break up to be sheltered, while in 12 cities, families usually have to spend the day outside of the shelter they use at night.
Seventeen percent of homeless people work, down slightly from recent years. Five percent are unaccompanied youth, and 10 percent are veterans.
Over half of the cities reported cutting back on the number of bags of food provided, and limiting the number of times people are allowed to receive food. Fourteen percent of those asking for food were denied due to short supply.
Applications for subsidized housing by low-income families increased this year by 83 percent in the cities surveyed. The average wait for public housing units is 24 months, while the wait for Section 8 vouchers, a federal housing subsidy for approved private rentals, is 27 months. In nearly half the cities, officials had stopped accepting applications for at least one form of subsidized housing because the waiting list is too long.
Most U.S. cities with populations over 1 million are included in the survey, with the prominent exception of New York City, and the southwestern metropolises of Houston, Dallas and San Diego. A number of smaller and medium-sized cities also responded to the survey, ranging from Burlington, VT to Salt Lake City, Utah.
In New York City, the situation is no better than elsewhere. The number of people housed in the shelters set a record of 38,638 in one night in December.
The number of homeless families stands at 9,211—more than double the number five years ago—and is climbing. This does not count the thousands of people who, due to the horrible conditions in the shelters, prefer to sleep out in the open, even in winter.
The authors of the SSCM report neither draw any conclusions about or make any recommendations to ameliorate, let alone abolish, the injustice of rising hunger and homelessness in the world’s richest nation.
The report does include, however, a number of comments from the surveys. While couched in the carefully crafted language of city bureaucrats, these remarks nonetheless point to ways in which today’s starvation conditions are being imposed on a broader section of workers.
In discussing the poor prospects for next year, a Boston official cites the “termination of unemployment benefits for long-term unemployed,” referring to the recent refusal of Congress to renew a 13-week federal extension of unemployment benefits that formerly kicked in after the basic 26-week state benefits expired.
A Cleveland respondent points to the reduction every month over the last three years in benefits for welfare recipients, a function of the strict two- and five-year time limits imposed by the Clinton administration’s 1996 welfare “reform.”
A Portland, Oregon, official expects “more people will be in lines and on waiting lists” due to state and local budget cuts. “Mainstream social service systems have faced severe declines in funding and have had to make cuts in services even as the needs have grown,” he writes. He adds, “Local sources of revenue to develop and fund truly affordable housing for the poorest are now almost non-existent. The homeless systems and emergency shelters will feel the pressures of these cuts.”
Under these circumstances, the outlook for “those on the margins” in America remains bleak. Some 90 percent of the cities surveyed expect both homelessness and hunger to only get worse in 2004.
