Although the new numbers reflect the relocation of many families to their original communities, Greenfield Mayor William Martin said the situation taxed the town's school system because Greenfield was obligated to find places for the student-age children.
SPRINGFIELD — State efforts to get homeless families out of hotels have borne no fruit in November, according to new figures released last week.
Statistics show that an almost identical number of families were living in hotels in Springfield, Holyoke, Chicopee and West Springfield, on Nov. 26 compared with Nov. 8 when pickets rallied outside a Chicopee Econo Lodge to protest the scores of homeless families languishing in motels across the state.
Moreover, with the exception of Springfield and West Springfield, there are actually more homeless in Western Massachusetts hotels now than in 2012. Statewide, that number has also risen in the last year. The cost to taxpayers is about $80 per family per room, per night, or more than $5 million a month.
“The program is just not accomplishing what we need to accomplish,” said state Sen. James Welch, D-West Springfield, who has been vocal on the issue. “It’s a frustrating situation.”
Welch pointed out that only about 40 communities in Massachusetts bear the burden of hosting some 2,021 families in hotels. He would like to see the state take a more comprehensive approach to the problem of homelessness.
“Until we address affordable housing we’ll be moving in circles,” he said.
Nov. 8 figures were not available for Greenfield, but 54 families live in motels there, compared with 33 in June 2012. Mayor William Martin said the homeless hotel population in September was up to 97 families with more than 100 children. The town’s Human Rights Commission expressed concern over the situation because many of the families were uprooted from eastern Massachusetts, where there was a scarcity of rooms.
“They were resettled in Greenfield,” Martin said. “They had to start all over again.”
Although the new numbers reflect the relocation of many families to their original communities, Martin said the situation taxed the town’s school system because Greenfield was obligated to find places for the student-age children.
State Sen. Gail Candaras, D-Wilbraham, who has worked to get more state money for homeless shelters, said the poor economy, coupled with a lack of rental housing, has created a crisis situation.
“This is a crisis in the greater Springfield area,” Candaras said, adding that, if not for the additional shelter funding, “we’d be having a tent city again.”
Candaras said families are safer in hotels than in shelters, but would be safer still in their own apartments.
“The only answer is more jobs,” she said. “We need to give people the opportunity to make a livable wage so they can get back on their feet and into homes.”
Massachusetts and New York are the only two states in the country that have assumed the obligation of immediately finding shelter for homeless families. In 2011, Massachusetts launched its HomeBASE program with the aim of freeing families from shelters and ushering them into permanent housing. However, applicants for hotel rooms overwhelmed the state within weeks and the census there swelled.
The state has attributed some of the recent increase to a freeze on federal subsidized housing.
