As homelessness continues to grow across Connecticut, leaders in the state’s cities say they are shouldering a disproportionate share of the burden of caring for the unhoused compared to their suburban neighbors.
Unhoused people often migrate to cities where services like shelters, soup kitchens and outreach are grouped, officials say, leading to the misperception that homelessness is a city problem.
But while social workers in several of those smaller communities say they are increasingly seeing their residents struggle with housing and homelessness, towns simply do not have the funding or the resources to address their needs.
With the crisis reaching new levels fueled by the increasing cost of living and a lack of affordable housing, advocates for the homeless, state legislators and other municipal leaders have said that the crisis requires more state funding, housing and collaboration to tackle the problem.
“The smaller towns — they have to offer more opportunities for housing. And if they can’t, the legislature has to look at towns like New Britain and Bristol and give them more resources,” said Manchester Mayor Jay Moran.
House Speaker Matt Ritter, D-Hartford, acknowledged that municipal governments have limited resources and that budgets get voted down in referendums, adding it is hard to increase spending.
However he posed this question: “How many suburban towns actually have (shelter) beds?”
“It is probably a question of zoning to some extent and if there is any municipality that has an existing facility or would like to open a facility and is looking for state support, I am not aware of that,” he said.
“It’s one thing to say we have no money but I also don’t know of anybody who has said we will take on the burden if we get funding. That might prompt the legislature or the governor or whomever to look carefully at that. Yes, it’s a resource problem, but it is a zoning and political problem in a lot of towns.”
Ritter said as a result the burden falls mainly on Hartford and other cities to address homelessness.
“But homelessness is not confined to the city of Hartford,” he said. “It exists everywhere. I agree that Hartford is going to have the largest shelters given our demographics. To think that there aren’t a lot of smaller shelters or spaces in some of these communities I don’t think it is just resources. It is a tough political issue.”
Sarah Fox, chief executive officer of the Connecticut Coalition to End Homelessness, said there are just few shelters in towns, like Cornerstone in Vernon and Beth-El Center in Milford.
“But the majority of resources are in (large) municipalities,” she said.
There are 5,860 people actively experiencing homelessness with 2,200 unsheltered, according to Fox. The shelters and soup kitchens are full, with the Coalition to End Homelessness stating that homeless services have to turn away 1 in 5 people because there is so much need.
State Sen. Saud Anwar, co-chair of the Public Health Committee, recently convened a group of 20 social workers from towns across the state and several lawmakers to discuss the issue. The group agreed that there is a dire need for more resources and that 211, Connecticut’s help line, is inadequate, with people waiting for hours to speak with someone.
“The towns don’t have the resources to manage this,” Anwar said. “The cities are left carrying the weight of the towns that are not taking care of their own citizens. The towns need to have a plan and start to look at this aspect and the state can do more as well.”
Gov. Ned Lamont has committed $6.9 million from a special $500 million reserve, which the legislature established to mitigate the loss of federal funding, for federally subsidized housing resources and case management. The governor on Monday released $2.6 million in state funding to increase call capacity at 211.
David Bednarz, spokesman for the governor, said the governor and his administration continue to work with providers to ensure they have the resources they need. Anwar said the additional funding for 211 is an important step forward.
Left to carry the weight
Mayor Arunan Arulampalam said Hartford is a city of 120,000 people where half of the property is not taxable, deeply slashing the city’s revenue. But, as “the center of the Greater Hartford area of 1.2 million people,” the city shoulders a variety of regional costs.
“We are about one tenth of the population, probably far less than a tenth of the tax base and yet for that 1.2 million people, we hold about 90% of the permanent homeless beds,” he said. “We are carrying a disproportionate amount of the burden. These are folks who come from South Windsor, Avon, Glastonbury and suburbs all around us that don’t have any permanent shelter beds.”
Arulampalam said the city has expanded the number of cold weather shelter beds in the city and it is still likely to be not enough.
Bristol Mayor Ellen Zoppo-Sassu said Bristol offers a variety of social services and it is attracting people who need help from other towns.
“Those other towns are choosing not to set up services or are in denial that services are needed or just don’t want to deal with it,” she said. “I have had some rather pointed conversations with our neighbors. It is one of those things — if you can’t set up the services, maybe you need to start funding ours.”
Pam French, a social worker in Plainville, said the system is broken.
“We can’t support them on our own,” she said.
Farmington Director of Community Services Nancy Parent said the wait for Section 8 housing averages 15 years.
“The last time we opened up the wait list, 8,272 people applied and we only took 100 people,” she said.
Erica Texeira, director of social and youth services for the town of Wethersfield, said more of the transient population from Hartford comes into the town in need of services and that the town does not have a line item budget dedicated to helping with the unhoused. The town relies on donations, Texeira said; the town’s low-income housing and subsidized housing for the elderly are not sufficient.
Matt Helman, director of Vernon social services, said some of the challenges the unhoused face include out-of-state landlords who are coming in and are far less willing to work with people who are struggling to pay the rent.
He also advocated for the building of more middle housing, post WWII starter houses, which are not as much in the market and are more affordable.
“If you don’t want to have housing that is affordable in your backyard, you are going to have homelessness in your front yard,” he said.
The challenge, Ritter said, is once you have a situation where someone is homeless you are at a difficult position emphasizing there aren’t enough beds and even if there are, it might not be the right fit for someone who has a spouse or a pet.
“What we need to look at in the legislature is avoiding that altogether,” he said. “I think we are looking at stipend programs that may kick in earlier. When you are couch surfing there are limitations when we can help people that maybe we have to reexamine. You will see the legislature look at it this year. That might solve some problems.”
Fox said it is about forging partnerships and providing resources for the social service directors in towns so they can provide the flexible funding.
“This should not be falling just on our cities,” she said. “Our role is to prevent, respond and house. It is about building unity and collaboration.”