[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 62 (Wednesday, May 18, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: May 18, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
    INTRODUCTION OF THE PERMANENT HOUSING FOR HOMELESS FAMILIES ACT

                                 ______


                        HON. COLLIN C. PETERSON

                              of minnesota

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, May 18, 1994

  Mr. PETERSON of Minnesota. Mr. Speaker, today I am introducing 
legislation to stop the wasteful spending of millions of Federal 
dollars to shelter homeless families in privately owned welfare hotels. 
This legislation will end the use of welfare hotels by developing more 
cost-effective and more humane methods of sheltering homeless families. 
I am very pleased to be joined in this important effort by my 
colleagues, Messrs. Flake of New York, Frank of Maine, Rangel of New 
York, and Vento of Minnesota, who share my concern about welfare 
hotels.
  The bill is budget neutral. It targets States that currently use 
welfare hotels to shelter homeless families for at least 30 days at a 
cost of $1,200 or more per family. The bill would permit States to use 
Federal funds that subsidize welfare hotels for alternative housing 
approaches such as the rehabilitation, construction, rental or purchase 
of permanent affordable housing. The State could not spend more funds, 
on average per homeless family, than it spent the preceding fiscal 
year.
  Welfare hotel costs are staggering. The cost of a welfare hotel room, 
up to $2,600 a month per family, could support two or three families in 
their own homes. In New York, 333 hotels are used to shelter over 1,400 
families at an average cost per family of $2,640 per month. In 
Massachusetts, 55 hotels are used to serve over 400 families at an 
average cost per family of $2,100 per month. In New Jersey, 18 hotels 
serve over 450 families at an average cost of $1,571 per month. The 
monthly $2,100-per-family payment to welfare hotels in Boston is three 
times the monthly cost of renting an apartment. Obviously, this is not 
a good deal for the taxpayer.
  Many of these welfare hotels are squalid. The heat and hot water are 
inadequate; bathrooms are inoperable; single rooms with one or two beds 
serve an entire family and doors have broken locks. Sometimes, families 
are split up because a hotel has a limit on the number of children 
allowed. Recently, a homeless woman living in the Center City Hotel in 
Washington, DC, could bring only two of her four children with her. She 
had to choose which two to bring and also find places for her other two 
children to stay. Some families are forced to move from hotel to hotel, 
because there are limits on the number of days a family can stay in one 
hotel. This affects the children's schooling, requiring them to repeat 
grades and lowering their achievement.
  In introducing this bill today my hope is that we can stop using 
costly welfare hotels to shelter homeless families.

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