The government in Washington, D.C. has a new plan to end homelessness in the city: stick them all in motel rooms indefinitely.
In the past, the city has housed homeless families only on the coldest nights, when the temperature drops below freezing, however, documents recently obtained by The Washington Post show the city has expanded this program to include the rest of the year.
During the months of June and July, the city housed nearly 150 families in hotel rooms across the city, the document shows, and the city increased the number of homeless housed in hotels in August.
Michael Czin, a spokesman for D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, said the hotels are just a temporary fix to the city’s homelessness problem.
“Motels are one of many tools the district will use to support those experiencing homelessness,” Czin said. “Utilizing motels is neither a long term solution for those individuals experiencing homelessness or a solution to end homelessness District wide.”
The nation’s capital is one of just a few cities that give homeless people the right to shelter when the weather drops below freezing. The right-to-shelter law obligates the city to provide “temporary emergency housing” to anyone who seeks it when conditions are forecasted to reach 32 degrees or below.
The city’s winter plan, which was circulated by city bureaucrats last week, said the city doesn’t plan to need as many beds for winter because it is just going to place families into shelters all year, instead of just during the winter.
The move to expand the program throughout the year comes as part of D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s bold plan to completely eliminate homelessness in the city.
Bowser added $145 million to the city’s budget this year to pay for new homelessness initiatives. She has promised to end family homelessness in the city by 2018 and “chronic” homelessness by 2025.
In order to eliminate homelessness in the city, Bowser said she would invest heavily in affordable housing through a $100 million trust fund each of year’s budget, and would shutter the troubled homeless shelter in the old D.C. General Hospital, in favor of smaller “transitional housing” in all parts of the district.
Update: This post was updated with comment from Michael Czin, a spokesman for Mayor Bowser.
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