How illegal immigration is hitting the homeless hardest and neglecting families

-Michele Steeb & Kevin Faulkner

Featured in the NYPost (August 24, 2024)

The United States migrant crisis — particularly in sanctuary states such as Massachusetts and New York — has brought another crisis into sharp focus: the neglect of America’s homeless families.

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey is now time-limiting homeless families in state shelters to accommodate the continued influx of migrant families.

What’s more, a recent Boston Globe investigation revealed that Healey’s administration placed hundreds of homeless children in hotels with registered sex offenders, allegations they initially and repeatedly rebuffed.

In New York City and San Diego — located in boastful sanctuary states — shelters are at capacity. Families are being forced to “line up” for shelter on the cities’ unsafe streets.

It is horrific. It is dire. And unfortunately, it was entirely foreseeable.

The lineage of neglect began with a 2009 decision made by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) — the nation’s largest funder of homelessness.

HUD narrowed the federal definition of homelessness to exclude families that were living “doubled-up” with family or friends, as well families that scraped up enough money for a motel room for a night. (If HUD pays for a family’s room, they are considered homeless.)

This decision rendered these families ineligible to be included in America’s annual homeless counts— resulting in a significant undercount of homeless Americans — and ineligible for the largest source of public assistance. 

The significance is witnessed in the count discrepancies. While HUD reported 653,000 homeless Americans in 2023, the Department of Education — using the unaltered definition — documented1,099,221 homeless K-12 students in the 2020-2021 school year (the latest data available).

This figure does not include the students’ parents nor any siblings outside of the K-12 system. 

The catastrophic consequences to homeless families will be felt for generations. 

Homeless children are much more likely to become addicted, mentally ill, and “seemingly unemployable” homeless adults . . . without early and effective intervention, that is.

Indeed, the latest data available from the United States Interagency Council in their 2020 Expanding the Toolbox report show this deterioration happening at an increasingly alarming rate.

Policy leaders across the nation — particularly San Diego elected officials who oversee the nation’s epicenter for illegal border crossings and a 20% increase in homeless K-12 students between 2018–2023— would do well to heed the “what not to do” lessons out of the Healey administration in Massachusetts.

First and most obvious, do not ignore homeless families. Rather, focus on creating a system to support them in permanently exiting homelessness.

One of us, Michele, led Northern California’s largest and most comprehensive program for homeless women and children for 13 years.

About 78% of the mothers she served struggled with substance abuse, 70% with domestic violence, 60% with mental illness, and 55% did not have a high school diploma or GED.

Mothers and their children spent 12-18 months in a safe, structured congregate living environment that provided them with time to recover and heal through therapy and to establish life skills such as parenting, budgeting, and employment training/readiness.

Mothers graduated with employment and the ability to serve as the primary provider for their families. Dozens have also gone on to become homeowners — a monumental feat, particularly for a single mother in California.

Elected officials should invest in creating a similar system to encourage the prosperity of families struggling with homelessness.

Next, do not risk the safety and well-being of those dealing with homelessness. Don’t forget, 90% of this cohort have already experienced extreme violence.

Which is why co-mingling them with registered sex offenders must be avoided.

That this is happening in Massachusetts is especially egregious considering Healey previously served as the state’s “Top Cop” — a period during which she portrayed herself as a champion for families whom she considered to be in harm’s way under the Trump administration’s border policies.

Finally, we must turn to both of our experiences at the front lines of America’s crisis of homelessness. During Kevin’s tenure as mayor of San Diego, homelessness experienced a double-digit decline.

Opening the San Diego Convention Center allowed us to efficiently and cost-effectively triage and temporarily house a significant portion of the most vulnerable homeless.

From there, we were able to move them into programs where they would be offered the help they needed.

As supervisor, Kevin is committed to getting everyone back to the table — providers, city and county officials — to replicate that success for the benefit of those struggling with homelessness, and the community at large.

The failure to acknowledge and address the true extent of family homelessness is a failure to uphold our nation’s values.

We must act now to bring the hidden crisis of family homelessness out of the shadows and address it with the experience, seriousness, and compassion it deserves.