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Greenbelt Alliance In the News
June 4, 2003
The affordable housing crisis is a quality-of-life
issue
GUEST COLUMN
MERLIN WEDEPOHL
Lamenting the lack of affordable housing in Contra Costa County is not
going to get results. What will get results is for ordinary residents
to learn about the issues surrounding public policy on affordable housing,
and then demand that elected officials respond by adopting strategies
to build homes and apartments that low-income people can afford to live
in.
The nine-county region will need to add more than 230,000 new homes before
2006, according to the Association of Bay Area Governments. Of those,
at least 72,000, nearly 10,000 a year, must be affordable to lower-income
families, from young working families to grandparents on fixed incomes.
California law mandates each city and county to plan for a fair share
of housing for people of all income levels. By definition, housing is
considered affordable if it costs no more than 30 percent of household
income.
Contra Costa County surpassed its goal for above-moderate-income housing,
but failed to meet its affordable-housing goal, according to the Housing
Report Card released last year by the Non-Profit Housing Association of
Northern California and the Greenbelt Alliance. Only a few of the communities
in the county are in compliance with the law in their housing element
plans.
If local governments do not act to raise the numbers of affordable housing
units in their communities, homelessness will increase. Anyone who lives
in the county knows that the impact of homelessness on education, public
safety, health, life expectancy, infant mortality, substance abuse, mental
illness and domestic violence is startling.
Preventing homelessness is cost-effective. Last year, Shelter Inc.'s homeless
prevention services helped 577 people. Of these, 212 people received temporary
financial assistance for rent or mortgage; 124 of them were children under
the age of 17. Most of those served were people between the ages of 18
and 50 who can look forward to a long and productive future.
Shelter Inc. successfully helped 70 percent increase their income and
88 percent maintain their housing. Nearly 90 percent of those who came
to Shelter Inc. in crisis were deemed safe, stable and thriving after
six months. In total, Shelter Inc. provided $170,000 in aid to these families.
How is this cost-effective? Consider this: Shelter Inc.'s family emergency
shelters served 58 families last year at a cost of $10,800 per family
for an average of 85 days. That amounts to $626,400, compared with the
$170,000 spent to prevent homelessness. Most number-crunchers would consider
that a sound investment.
Remember, this takes only the financial cost of homelessness into consideration.
It does not include the impact of social dysfunction and the human emotional
toll homelessness takes on both children and parents who become homeless.
Life expectancy, too, drops dramatically for the homeless. A study at
Tulane University found that median life expectancy for the homeless is
51 years, compared with 77 years in the general population. The infant
mortality rate was 60 percent higher and the post neonatal mortality was
twice as high, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Join the Association of Homeless and Housing Service Providers in urging
elected officials to meet their responsibilities regarding affordable
housing.
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Merlin Wedepohl is executive director of Shelter Inc. of Contra Costa
County, a nonprofit organization that provides services to low-income
and homeless people to help them obtain housing and achieve economic self-sufficiency.
