The Bay State’s cash-strapped emergency shelter system could run out of money within a matter of days or weeks, a top lawmaker has warned, lending more urgency to closed-door talks aimed at finding a solution.
“We’re hearing sometime mid- to end of April, but there are other flexible funds that they can use,” Senate Ways & Means Committee Chairperson Michael Rodrigues, D-1st Bristol/Plymouth, said late last week of the information that had been shared with him by the Healey administration, State House News Service reported.
In an appearance on WCVB-TV’s “On the Record” program on Sunday, state House Speaker Ronald J. Mariano, D-3rd Norfolk, offered a slightly more open-ended answer that did not downplay the severity of the nearly $2 billion problem the state now faces.
“We were told sometime in the spring [the funding] was going to run out,” Mariano told hosts Ed Harding and Sharman Sacchetti.
Senior House and Senate negotiators are now trying to work out their differences on a supplemental funding bill that would impose − with some tweaks – a nine-month limit on shelter stays.
Costs for the state’s emergency shelter system, which houses both permanent Massachusetts residents and an ever-growing number of migrants, are expected to soar past $900 million a year over the next two years, MassLive previously reported.
Last week, the House introduced a $57.9 billion budget proposal for the new fiscal year that starts July 1 that would set aside $500 million for emergency shelters.
That amount includes $175 million from a state savings account. The Senate has proposed making the full $860 million in the account available for shelter spending, according to State House News Service.
Speaking to WCVB-TV on Sunday, Mariano, like Democratic Gov. Maura Healey, laid full blame for the state’s current predicament on lawmakers in Washington D.C., who have not been able to reach any accord on fixes to the nation’s immigration laws.
“It’s an election year, we don’t know who’s going to win,” Mariano told the station. “We don’t know how they’re going to deal with this problem. The problem isn’t our creation. The problem was created in Washington. They have to fix it.”
Democrats who control the Legislature and the executive branch, however, have resisted making wholesale changes or repealing the state’s Right to Shelter Law, which obligates the commonwealth to provide services to most people who seek them.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen next year, if we get a bill, it’s going to be close to [$1 billion],” Mariano said. “A lot is going to depend on what controls we can make work for this program.”
Last fall, Healey’s office imposed a 7,500-family cap on the system. But it was obligated to open overflow sites as the system quickly filled beyond that self-imposed capacity.
As of Monday afternoon, there were 7,499 families in the shelter system, with 18 families enrolled in the last 24 hours, state data showed.
