The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Advocates say there are 1,000 homeless people in CT
Advocates for Connecticut’s unhoused population warned on Wednesday that there are now 1,000 homeless people in Connecticut, and they are in danger of serious health consequences at a time when the state needs to both increase funding and speed up its delivery to social service agencies.
For state Rep. Bobby Sanchez, a director of a shelter in Meriden, the consequences are real and potentially heart-breaking at a time when the budget in one of the nation’s wealthiest states is realizing robust surpluses.
“I can tell you that I am struggling to retain people or to hire people to do this work because of the funding,” Sanchez said. “I can tell you the struggles are deep.”
On Tuesday night, Sanchez, D-New Britain, was driving through his hometown when he noticed five tents set up on a vacant lot. “I said what’s going on here? We can do better. We’re talking about every year we go through this and every year they have to beg for the funding to help people, individuals who are homeless, to get them sheltered, to get them back on their feet.”
During a news conference in the State Capitol complex, social service providers noted that winter was set to begin 10:30 p.m. Thursday, and that 70 unhoused people have already died this year. At the same time, $5 million in sorely needed funding has been slow to arrive.
“We are seeing a crisis,” said Sarah Fox, CEO of the Connecticut Coalition to
End Homelessness, representing about 75 service providers and organizations. “We’re seeing a national crisis, an affordable housing crisis and in our streets. We’re seeing a rising tide of homelessness caused by the affordable housing crisis that we’re working to, obviously, manage as best as we can with families facing skyrocketing rents and our seniors being forced out of our housing.”
Fox said that to solve the crisis of the unhoused in Connecticut, $300 million is needed, and in the upcoming session advocates will ask for at least $20 million a year to build new shelters. Surveys indicate that more than a quarter of unhoused people have experienced job loss, with drug and alcohol abuse, evictions and mental illness in descending order of reasons.
State Rep. Jay Case, a conservative Republican from Winsted, blamed a Connecticut economy that has pushed dozens of people to live in tents, isolated in the rural woodlands of Northwestern Connecticut. He said that the state Department of Housing only recently released $5 million for cold weather shelters.
“To me, that’s not humane, we needed to have that money earlier,” said Case, a top GOP lawmaker on the legislative Human Services Committee. “Now we are searching for shelter space to put people.” He credited Torrington Mayor Elinor Carbone with finding a stopgap $40,000 to shelter some people in local hotels. “We do have $256,000 for the Northwest corner for shelter, but we don’t have a shelter yet,” he said, stressing that the slowness of funding left advocates without money to use as deposits on potential shelter buildings.
“Tomorrow is the first day of winter,” Case said. “Today is the day to get people into shelter. We have to take a look and see what housing is available to shelter these people who need a step up, who need to get services, who need to find a place to live. If you see some of the families out there, the economy hit their lives. Some people were a paycheck away and guess what? That paycheck is no longer. They’re in their cars.”
Tanya Barrett, senior vice president of the United Way of Connecticut, said that the agency’s intake specialists are confirming an increase in need for shelter at a time when funding that had been available during the pandemic, is winding down.
Deirdre Houlihan DiCara, executive director of FISH of Northwest Connecticut, said that the 35bed shelter and food pantry is currently hosting five families and 10 children, including a baby who was born last week. She estimated there are about about 100 homeless people in their 900-square mile service area. The shelter uses airborne drones to monitor the homeless in the woodlands. “This is really a public health crisis,” she said.
State Rep. Corey Paris, D-Stamford, said the estimated 30 unhoused children currently in Fairfield County not only highlight the needs of the holiday season, but overshadows many other public problems. There are an estimated 262 elderly people statewide who are also homeless, he said.
“Christmas is not even a thought for them,” Paris said. “Hanukkah is not a thought for them, but it must remain a thought for the rest of us. I think this is going to create a bigger conversation, not just in terms of it being a public health crisis but a human rights crisis. The one thing I believe we have to come to terms with is the great reckoning that if you don’t want to see homelessness in the state of Connecticut, you don’t have to see it, based on design by the towns and cities.”
“It’s a moral failure, because none of us should be surprised that there is a winter,” said state Sen. Saud Anwar, D-South Windsor, a physician who detailed the experience of seeing finger and toe amputations that an unhoused patient had to endure because of the effects of frostbite. “This is a failure of design, a failure of priorities. This is common humanity.”
“In Connecticut, you pull off the highway, you see homelessness,” said state Rep. Jillian Gilchrest, D-West Hartford, cochairwoman of the Human Services Committee. “If you’re walking on a path and you see a book bag under a tree, you see homelessness. If you talk to a teacher, they’re going to tell you about the children they know who are living in their cars. I keep being told that Connecticut is in a good financial state, that we’re doing great. We’re not doing great as a state when there are 1,000 homeless.”