More Poor on Street Predicted if Welfare Is Cut

Crowded homeless shelters will be forced to turn away tens of thousands more people than they do now if Los Angeles County slashes its monthly general relief welfare payments, advocates for the homeless said Monday.

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is expected to vote today on a proposal made last week by Chief Administrative Officer Richard B. Dixon to reduce general relief from $341 to $299 a month as a way to meet the county’s record budget shortfall. Mayor Tom Bradley is opposed to the proposal.

At a news conference in front of the county welfare office in Echo Park, members of the Los Angeles Coalition to End Homelessness said a 12% cut in general relief would make the county’s poorest men and women unable to afford rooms even at single-occupancy residential hotels, known as SROs. Based on a survey of 57 shelters--representing more than 26% of the total of emergency shelter beds in the county--the group calculated that 131,400 people per year would be turned away from those shelters if the county slashes general relief.

“If you extrapolate from the survey,” said Bob Erlenbusch, executive director of the coalition, “a half-million people will be turned away every year if general relief is cut.”

The 57 shelters now turn away about 116,000 people a year because of inadequate space, Erlenbusch noted.

Patricia Huff, the city’s homeless services coordinator, agreed that the county’s proposed general relief cuts will force thousands more to live on the streets.

“Even though G.R. is very small, it does assist people with being able to afford shelter, at least temporarily, at a hotel or motel,” she said.

“The city is going to find itself in an unmanageable situation because we do not have enough shelter beds to meet the current need, let alone the additional demand that would be created if general relief is cut,” she said.

In a letter sent to supervisors Sept. 22, Bradley urged the county to honor an agreement made with civil rights groups last year that raised general relief to its current level.

“The settlement agreements were entered into by both the city and the county of Los Angeles in good faith and in the interest of our community’s poorest residents,” his letter stated.

“Thus, the terms of the agreements should be preserved in their entirety as both the city and county consider necessary budget cuts.”

In addition to slashing welfare, Dixon has proposed eliminating about one-eighth of the Department of Public Social Services work force and making deep cuts in the Sheriff’s Department, health services and libraries.

But advocates for the homeless argued that the county should not attempt to balance its $13-billion budget on the backs of the indigent.

“Our position is that this great, big, rich society ought to provide for the most indigent people . . . so they have at least the minimum level of housing, food, clothes on their back,” said the Rev. Gene Boutillier of the United Church of Christ. “If they can’t even live in a flophouse or a (residential) hotel, that’s too low.”

Erlenbusch said: “We do not want the county to pit homeless people against people with AIDS, seniors, women or children, but to find alternative revenues, including raising the sales tax, raising utility taxes and increasing fees on developers.”

More than 90,000 single men and women in the county receive general relief, costing the county $309 million a year.

Welfare recipients and their advocates emphasized that general relief already is too low.

“Right now, $341 means three weeks in a rat-infested hotel and one week out,” Erlenbusch said, adding that “$299 will mean two weeks in a rat-infested hotel and two weeks trying to find shelter.”

Anthony Greene, a general relief recipient, said the money he has left after paying nearly $200 in rent goes toward medical bills.

“I can’t tell you how bad it’s going to be if they cut general relief from $341 to $299,” Greene said. “It’s hard enough to live on G.R. now.”