Big-City Mayors Edgy Over Fallout of Welfare Reform

Citing anxiety over the effect of federal welfare reform on conditions in America’s urban centers, big-city mayors are predicting that demand for emergency food and shelter services will increase next year.

A survey of officials in 29 big cities paints “a bleak picture of the impact that welfare reform, food stamp cuts and immigrant benefit cuts will have on hunger and homelessness,” states the new report by the United States Conference of Mayors. “Virtually all expect that hunger and homelessness will increase as a result of the recently enacted changes in federal programs.”

The annual survey notes that for a 12th consecutive year, demand for emergency services outstripped resources in big cities. In Los Angeles, officials said that the number of emergency food assistance facilities fell last year, with many shutting for lack of money.

Overall, the report showed that requests for emergency food aid rose an average of 11% in 1996, with 83% of the cities surveyed reporting an increase. Demand for emergency shelter rose 5% overall, with 71% of cities reporting an increase.

Cardell Cooper, mayor of East Orange, N.J., and vice chairman of the conference’s task force that produced the report, called it his “sad duty” to note once again that demand for emergency services outstripped city officials’ ability to meet them in most big cities.

“This year, as in every previous year we have conducted this survey, demand for both emergency food and emergency shelter has increased in the majority of our 29 survey cities,” Cooper said.

He pointed to a bit of good news contained in the report, however: while the increase in hunger was higher overall than last year, some cities reported that demand had leveled off or declined. And, he said, while homelessness is still rising, it is doing so at a much slower rate.

“After surveying these problems for so many years, we are pleased to see somewhat lower rates of increase in overall demand for food and shelter and we’re pleased that some cities are reporting that the demand has leveled off or gone down,” Cooper said.

But results were uneven. Officials in Los Angeles, for example, said that requests for food “appear level” with previous years but noted that “there is already unmet need. The ongoing hunger crisis is now made more severe by the implementation of welfare reform.”

The mayors praised the Clinton administration for pushing increased federal spending in their cities but they expressed grave concerns about a future with limited federal welfare supports.

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President Clinton signed into law a sweeping, GOP-crafted welfare reform measure that ends a 60-year-old federal guarantee of direct financial assistance to the poor. In its place, individual states will receive lump-sum grants with the freedom and responsibility to carry out their own welfare programs--provided they adhere to federal requirements limiting aid to five years over a lifetime and requiring most recipients to find work after two years.

“Most officials fear that welfare reform and cuts in emergency aid will exacerbate their problems, forcing more people out of their homes,” said Denver Mayor Wellington Webb. “I’m anxious because I’m going to be spending more time in the statehouse and I don’t know what the statehouse is going to do.”