CINCINNATI — Hamilton County is seeing an increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness. Organizations like Strategies to End Homelessness attribute this to a large demand for limited housing in an inflated economy.
“There were really two parts to what happened during the pandemic," CEO Kevin Finn said. "You did moratoriums on evictions, but you also had large amounts of money available to help people who had gotten behind on their rent.”
The end of COVID-era federal funding for eviction prevention programs and emergency rental assistance only ramped up the load for those at Our Daily Bread Soup Kitchen and Social Center.
“We increased about 30% from where we were with our pre-COVID numbers," executive director Georgine Getty said. "And then we had another 30% jump this year since May.”
Getty said that's a jump from serving 200-300 meals a day to serving about 500-600 meals a day.
For Getty, the issue is housing and local laws in the Tri-State area. Getty cited efforts in Kentucky to criminalize homelessness. The law imposes a class B misdemeanor for second offenses and carries a maximum $250 fine and 90 days in jail.
“Kentucky passed a really Draconian law about prohibiting people from sleeping outside," Getty said. "And we’ve been seeing a lot of people coming from Kentucky who don’t feel safe being there who are looking for services in Cincinnati now.”
Other homeless advocates said they believe the local response to the homeless crisis has been stunted by federal requirements.
"The federal government provides $28 million a year to effect homelessness," Flynn said. "We’re not allowed to use any of that money for prevention. We have to wait for people to be on the street or in a shelter before we can help them.”
Flynn said there's a very small amount of emergency rental assistance to help people with eviction notices left now compared to a couple of years ago when American Rescue Plan funds were free-flowing into local programs and initiatives. Experts say the average cost to house someone post-homelessness is about $4,700. But, by preventing a person from becoming homeless, they say that the cost is reduced to about $1,650.
When asked what can be done to help, Getty said making COVID-era programs a more permanent and funded fixture locally.
“A lot of times what happens is people get behind," said Getty. "They get behind, they’re in between jobs. They’re having a hard time catching up. It’s that couple months of rental assistance, this is what we learned during COVID; a few months of rental assistance can make all of the difference in preventing somebody from going through the drama of being homeless.”
