The District has just 12 emergency beds to house youth under the age of 18 who are not with their parents and find themselves homeless. This actually is a 100 percent increase from earlier this year, when the Department of Human Services (DHS) had only six beds. DCFPI thanks the agency for this expansion and hopes DHS is correct that this will be enough to house all homeless youth this winter. However, serious concerns remain.
DCFPI Policy Analyst Kate Coventry testified Tuesday on the District’s Winter Plan, the document outlining how the District will protect homeless residents from cold weather injury during the upcoming winter.
The Interagency Council on Homelessness (ICH)’made up of representatives from DC government, nonprofit providers, advocates, and homeless and formerly homeless leaders’help guide the city’s homelessness policies and votes each year on the Winter Plan. The ICH has voted twice to reject this winter’s proposed plan because of concerns about adequate shelter for unaccompanied minors’youth under age 18 who are not with their parents. Many ICH members have asked the Department of Human Services to develop a contingency plan to ensure that youth are fully protected.
ICH members became particularly concerned about homeless youth because one local provider had to turn away 131 youth between February and May due to lack of shelter space. That prompted the Department of Human Services to identify funding for six additional emergency youth beds this winter. The hope is that each youth will only need an emergency bed for a few days while staff help identify a permanent place to stay. So, each bed will serve multiple youth over the course of the winter.
Yet there is concern that some winter nights may find more than 12 youth who need shelter. For single adults and families with children, the city has contingency plans in case need outstrips shelter capacity on a particular night. No such plan exists for homeless youth. DCFPI strongly recommends that the District create a similar plan for youth, outlining which agency will respond if the youth shelters are at capacity and how that agency will ensure that youth are inside for the remainder of the night.
DCFPI urges the Department of Human Services to work with the Child and Family Services Agency and other Interagency Council on Homelessness members to develop this contingency plan to ensure that all youth are protected from the cold.
