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PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Alison Wilkey, Director of Government Affairs and Strategic Campaigns at Coalition for the Homeless
3:27:15
·
3 min
Alison Wilkey from the Coalition for the Homeless testified about concerns regarding the city's attempts to limit access to City FHEPS (Family Homelessness & Eviction Prevention Supplement) vouchers. She highlighted three main issues: the city potentially reneging on a $215 million agreement for eviction prevention, a proposed increase in tenant rent contribution, and ethical concerns about a new research study.
- Criticized the city for potentially backing out of a $215 million investment in City FHEPS that could keep 7,500 households housed
- Opposed the plan to increase tenant rent contribution from 30% to 40% after 5 years, calling it a dangerous precedent that would enshrine rent burden into city policy
- Questioned the ethics of a new research study (CRIB pilot) that would provide City FHEPS vouchers to only some pregnant people arriving at PATH, leaving others without assistance
Alison Wilkey
3:27:15
Hi.
3:27:15
Good afternoon, chairs.
3:27:18
My name's Allison Wilkie.
3:27:19
I'm the director of government affairs and strategic campaigns at the Coalition for the Homeless.
3:27:24
So in hearing after hearing, commissioner Park comes here and talks about the success of city Pheps in moving people out of shelter, how it keeps people successfully housed.
3:27:34
But I wanna talk about three ways that the city is trying to limit access to city Pheps.
3:27:39
First is the agreement that was made as part of the city for all city of yes text amendment that would have provided $215,000,000 eviction to receive city feps.
3:27:54
It appears that the city is reneging on that agreement, and that agreement would keep, we estimate 7,500 households housed if if we had that $215,000,000 investment, and that would be for two years for those households.
3:28:12
You know, the administration appears to be walking away from this, and we really urge the city council to fight to make sure that that that money is going towards city feps for people facing eviction.
3:28:22
The second way that I want to talk about the city limiting city feps is through the increase in the sixth year to the tenant's portion of the rent to 40%.
3:28:34
You know, doing this would enshrine rent burden into city policy.
3:28:39
40% means that you are rent burdened.
3:28:42
And who else has done this or tried to do this?
3:28:45
President Trump in his first administration tried to raise the tenant's share of rent to 35 for federally subsidized housing.
3:28:55
The Adams administration is proposing going even further and raising it to 40%.
3:29:00
It is a dangerous precedent to send to send, and I think we really need to push back hard on doing this, not only because of that precedent, but because this would harm households, and the $11,000,000 savings that the commissioner is citing would would disappear when you would see families entering shelter.
Molly Eckerle
3:29:18
I also just want to
Alison Wilkey
3:29:19
talk about the crib pilot briefly.
3:29:22
You know, the city's putting forward this as a research study, but one of the interventions would be getting city feps, which we know already works.
3:29:32
And so why wouldn't the city just actually provide city feps vouchers to all pregnant people arriving at PATH rather than creating this research study that would have a control group that receives nothing.
3:29:44
I mean it kind of violates the ethical principles of research which say that you should offer any benefit to all participants in research, and yet this is creating a control group of pregnant people who would get nothing while offering the benefits to only some based on random selection.
3:30:03
And you could do this, you could still have the research by just giving pregnant people all access to city faps or to pathways home if that's a better option, and just compare that to the status quo of what has been.
3:30:14
Like they don't need to have a control group here that is getting nothing while some people are getting this benefit.
3:30:21
You know I think I heard Commissioner Park talking a lot about reining in the city febs budget, but the fact is when people can't pay for their housing it cascades into other parts of the city's budget.
3:30:32
And so if we're not paying for it with city febs, we're gonna be paying for it in DHS's budget, we're gonna be paying for it in benefits, we're gonna be paying for in a whole bunch of other ways.
3:30:41
And I'll submit full testimony, written testimony later.