Ohio Housing Solutions

11/25/02  Warren, Ohio

by Brian Davis  Executive Director

Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless

            There is no greater expression of the absolute inattention toward an affordable housing policy within the State of Ohio than the statistics from the U.S. Conference of Mayors, which documents that requests for shelter have increased in Cleveland every year for the past 17.  During the recession of the early 1990s through the booming stock market of the late 1990s and today, the City of Cleveland has had to serve more people in need of shelter.  The State of Ohio legislature or Governor's office did very little to address this brewing crisis in Cleveland and most urban cities in Ohio.

            Some have charged a rural bias at the Statehouse, which has caused the Ohio political leadership to ignore poverty issues.  Ohio Policy Matters has documented a dramatic growth in foreclosures rising 155% since 1994.  There were more than 43,000 foreclosures filed in 2001 with 24,000 Ohio families losing their housing at sheriff sales in the same year.  Rural counties emerged with the highest percentage increases in sheriff sales between 1994 and 2001.  The State Legislature and the Governor have done very little to help these Ohio families who are seeing their hope of homeownership dissolve.

            Those living in poverty or on the brink of poverty have seen housing become more and more out of reach requiring an individual to make $9.29 per hour working 40 hours per week in order to afford a one bedroom apartment.  A family must make $11.79 per hour in order to afford a two bedroom apartment at 40 hours per week in the State of Ohio.   This is a 25% increase just since 1997 in rental prices, and leaders in Ohio have done very little to address this crisis. 

            These facts are readily available to state legislators and certainly to the Governor who spoke very little about housing and homelessness in Ohio.  Leadership means addressing problems that cause suffering and not just because it polls high in public opinion surveys.  Here are some stories of ordinary Ohioans who have felt the pain of homelessness or struggle because of the lack of affordable housing in Ohio.

            Marsha in Cleveland struggles with odd jobs in order to pay the high interest mortgage to a sub-prime lender who is charging her astronomical fees.  Greg in Cincinnati toils with temporary labor jobs as a diversion from the lure of alcohol while he faces the reality that he will never make enough to afford an apartment.  Robert in Youngstown lives under a bridge because the limited social service network has failed to build a trusting relationship with him.  Finally, Beth and her family that stay at the YWCA shelter in Columbus are trying to put all the pieces together (jobs, day care, housing, and healthcare) to find the ticket into stability.

            These and the thousands of other citizens of Ohio facing a stability crisis need to be a priority in the State House in the face of budget deficits.  Ohio and the rest of the United States went through a period of prosperity in the 1990s, but we never did get around to reducing homelessness.  Putting money into education while a family cannot find a place to live is a waste.  If children move two or three times in a school year, they do not learn no matter how nice the facilities are at their schools.  Diverting general funds into the "Third Frontier" while these new workers have no where that is affordable to live is useless.    No state leader has even come close to addressing the decreases in affordable housing for the past 17 years, and now we are struggling with budgetary shortfalls.  Marsha, Greg, Robert and Beth's hopes of stable housing will again be pushed aside while we try to balance the budget. 

            I am encouraged to see the Governor and State Legislature convene stakeholders from both urban and rural areas to begin to address the problems that continually plague our state.  Out of this process, we need a leader to articulate a new vision for the state of Ohio in which all of our boats are lifted by a current of progress.  We need a plan to address the expanding affordable housing crisis in Ohio.  We need this committee to put on paper a strategy to move beyond band-aid type solutions to a plan that actually moves homeless people into stable housing.  Ohio will continue to struggle if there is not a clear outline for humanely assisting the mentally ill into nurturing environments.  We ask that this committee begin to address addictions as a health crisis and not as an opportunity to expand the criminal justice system.  It is essential that state leaders confront the tragedies that prevent the full talents of all of our citizens from moving the state forward.  For too long we have neglected housing, economic security, health care and civil rights for all of our citizens leading to huge numbers of our citizen's wandering the urban centers looking for help.

            In Cleveland, one-third of the men's homeless population served their country as honored veterans of the armed forces.  I see hostility and resentment when discussion turns toward expending public money on lazy, drug addicted homeless people who made poor decisions that led them to the doors of the local shelters.  I have to wonder if those who served the United States deserve housing stability because they gave some portion of their life to protect liberty.  I also wonder what the 7 and 2 year old daughters of Beth at the YWCA shelter did to deserve the disruption in their lives caused by their poverty.  In the end, we only punish ourselves by forcing our citizens into shelters because of their bad decisions or addictive personalities by paying huge amounts for emergency services.

            Government exists to "promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty."  In Ohio, we must return to these founding values and move the population to a position of stability.  The State of Ohio must keep Beth and the other mothers living in the shelters in central Ohio close at heart while preparing these recommendations.  These mothers and families throughout Ohio are finding housing out of reach and give up on finding employment that pays a housing wage.

            Ohio has seen a large amount of affordable housing disappear over the last six years.   We have seen small developments, mostly in the area of senior housing, but not anywhere near the number of units that we lost.  We also saw a large number of jobs that pay a decent housing wage disappear and were replaced by hospitality and service jobs that pay near the minimum wage.  Cleveland has seen a sharp rise in chronic health problems, especially AIDS, that rob our community of the talents and expertise of some of our brightest citizens.  We still face racism in housing, jobs selection and advancement, criminal sentencing, as well as educational opportunities that continue to keep a segment of our population in poverty. 

            Other states have put in place strategies to end homelessness in the next ten years, and even more cities are putting those plans in place.  Massachusetts, California, and the more conservative Indiana have all put in practice a plan to significantly reduce homelessness by 2010.  Ohio is behind other states, but this task force could move us closer to the goal of a state that prevents and protects its citizens from the scourge of homelessness.  Cities like Philadelphia, Clark County Washington, and even Columbus Ohio have all begun to put in place plans to end homelessness, but without help from the state and federal government these plans will fail.  Ohio taught the United States to fly and we have the talent in this state to now teach the rest of the country how to address poverty.

            We need to refocus our attention on the well being of families who have fallen by the wayside in the state of Ohio.  We must recapture the feeling that government can solve problems in our society.  We must set our brightest minds in Ohio to the task of addressing homelessness, the housing crisis, the reconstruction of the safety net without creating dependency, and the expansion of employment opportunities that pay a living wage.  We to put on paper a plan that takes bold steps toward building affordable housing, will set aside partisan differences to address homelessness, and will make recommendations that begin to reduce poverty in Ohio.

            So what do we need to do to address the housing crisis that complicates all that the state government does with regard to human services?

1.     Put a plan in place to dramatically increase affordable housing. 

The least that we can do is to provide a dedicated revenue source for the Ohio Housing Trust Fund.  All state officials should advocate for the Federal government to return to the development, preservation and expansion of affordable housing options.  Federal funds are required to match any state affordable housing efforts.  Without a state, national, and local effort we will never be able to attract business or keep the state's population growing.

2.     Expand the options available to people in need of affordable housing.

A diverse menu of housing options should be available to low-income individuals.  For some, supportive housing with case management assistance is best to keep a person from exhausting emergency services.  Families are in need of down payment assistance or help with rental deposits.  Laid off manufacturers might need short term rental assistance while they look for a job to stave off entering a shelter.  The point is that we need resources to construct programs to keep people off of the streets.

3.     Expand Homelessness Prevention efforts.

Studies from around the state prove that shelter, incarceration, and committal to a mental institution are all expensive alternatives to stabilizing a person in their housing.  Without an effort to preserve the existing affordable housing and intervention when a person is evicted or faces a foreclosure notice, Ohio will continue to fall behind the rest of the country.  A quick response can keep a family from having to use the overtaxed and expensive shelter system.  Prevention does not further strain the overburdened health system, education system, or treatment centers.  After all a family is more likely to become sick on the streets or in the shelters.  Communities have to figure out ways to get children back to their school of origin after a family becomes homeless.  Some individuals or families get so depressed over their homelessness that they self medicate with drugs or alcohol.  Homelessness is expensive and is almost always preventable.

4.     Stop the influx of people into homeless shelters.

Prisons, hospitals, and mental health institutions are all dropping people into the shelters because of the lack of discharge policy.  State funded programs are all contributing to the increases in homelessness and the affordable housing crisis.  If prisons were instructed to help those who have served their time get into stable housing, they might begin to voice concern over the lack of housing.  If welfare offices got involved in housing assistance, this large work force would understand the difficulty poor families are having in finding housing that they can afford.  We should take off the table the option of releasing people from mental institutions to the streets or shelters.  State agencies and state funded organizations are all contributing to the rising number of homeless people.  

Start the process today of ending homelessness in Ohio by making bold recommendations and putting in place a long term strategy to develop and preserve affordable housing.