D.C. HOMELESSNESS DOUBLES NATIONAL AVERAGE AS LIVING COSTS SOAR

D.C. HOMELESSNESS DOUBLES NATIONAL AVERAGE AS LIVING COSTS SOAR

[1/2/17]  In the shadow of the house where Frederick Douglass spent his final 17 years, and just across the snaking Anacostia River from the trendy Washington Navy Yard neighborhood, are the Valley Place Family Apartments, a transitional housing complex for some of the most vulnerable residents of the nation’s capital.

This is where two mothers, Anita White and Jasmine Kelly, awake at dawn each day to make a life for their families.

Ms. White, 27, and Ms. Kelly, 25, live in what amounts to a parallel universe in Southeast Washington, as the city and its suburbs accumulate staggering wealth while its poorest residents grow poorer. In December, a devastating survey of 32 big cities prepared by the United States Conference of Mayors showed Washington with the highest rate of homelessness. There are 124 homeless people for every 10,000 residents here, more than twice the national average. Nationally, homelessness has shrunk 12.9 percent over the last seven years.

The survey numbers were taken from the annual “Point in Time” count distributed by the Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, a nonprofit that works with the local government. As of last January, according to the count, 8,350 people experienced homelessness: 318 on the street, 6,259 in emergency shelters and 1,773 in transitional housing. Outside of the homeless numbers, 17.3 percent of residents in the District of Columbia live in poverty, according to recent census data.

Those who research and confront the homeless crisis — members of the Conference of Mayors, District of Columbia officials, legal advocates, shelter providers and homeless parents — all point to one thing: the cost of urban living. Median home prices in Washington soared to record highs last year.

“There are no ‘new homeless,’” said Michael Ferrell, the executive director of the Coalition for the Homeless, which runs 10 shelter programs in Washington, including Valley Place. “The one single thing that really has changed is the lack of affordable housing.”

“The housing that’s being created today in the District is not for working-class people,” he said.

The problems for Ms. White and Ms. Kelly, who have been at Valley Place for over a year, look familiar to many here…..more here

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