"I think we'll see an increase in people sleeping on the streets, people sleeping in their cars ," Hinman said. It is the judgment of Larsons attorney that justice can best be achieved if neutral judges can read both of the reply briefs, he has prepared. Thomas and other advocates are pushing the state to step in and move money around in the budget, which the state legislature is currently negotiating, to fill the holes.Īsked if she thinks Skagit County's homeless residents will head to neighboring Whatcom and Snohomish counties, Hinman said those counties are looking at their own reductions. "The smaller counties are also more at risk because they don't necessarily have the revenue available to make up for their county's shortfall," Thomas said. Michele Thomas, policy and advocacy director at the Washington Low-Income Housing Alliance, said she's hearing from counties across the state that they're seeing "at least" a 50% decline in funding for shelters and rental assistance programs. Whether the trend continues depends on the trajectory of the economy, and some projections say there won’t be any shortfall in the next biennium, Kelleher said. "But COVID funds are almost gone, and the revenue shortfall is likely beyond what can be mitigated in the middle term with fund management alone." "The revenue drop off is significant, and both counties and the state are able to use COVID-related funds in the near term to hold services at current level," Kelleher wrote in the email. This is a common story across the state, Tedd Kelleher, the housing policy director at the state Department of Commerce confirmed in an email.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |