Some families run out of time in Massachusetts' emergency assistance shelters

Hundreds of migrants who were issued notices back in July and August that they would have to leave Massachusetts’ shelter system in 90 days have now reached that limit.

The move was part of a new legislation requiring emergency assistance shelter stays be capped at nine months. Thousands of families had already been in the system for many months when the time limit was implemented. The state began sending notices to some of those families in July.

Since then, 838 families received exit notices. Of those, 680 were granted a 90-day extension, and 217 received a second 90-day extension, according to the state. Twenty-six were found ineligible for extension. Another 194 families have exited shelter entirely.

“It really is leaving families who have been there for over nine months in a lot of terror and limbo being like, are we going to get selected next?” said Andrea Park, director of community driven advocacy at Massachusetts Law Reform Institute.

Park said the initial understanding from advocates was that the law would start on June 1, so families wouldn’t have to leave until nine months after that date, giving them more time to secure housing.

“But then, you know, EOHLC [Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities] chose to interpret that retroactively,” she said. “Now everybody who’s been in the shelter system for at least nine months is subject to getting that what they call a selection.”

Park called the process confusing, because it is unclear when the 90-day extensions start, and if the 90-day notice is included in that.

Park said the changes have caused a lot of work for providers and and “some real psychological trauma on the families who just don’t know what to expect.”

Extensions aren’t application-based. “We consider all families based on their case records,” said a spokesperson with the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities in a message. Providers in shelters grant those extensions based on their engagement with families, he said.

All families given notices had been in shelter for at least nine months on the day they received their 90 days’ notice, according to the state. The state notifies families of their second extension eligibility 45 days ahead of the end of their first extension. This is to allow families time to plan for exit if they are not eligible for the second extension, according to the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities.

“It is an extraordinarily difficult time as the system attempts to move families out of shelter and into more permanent situations,” said Kate Barrand, president and CEO of Horizons for Homeless Children, which works with children in those facilities.

Barrand added that she feels like the collaboration between the state and nonprofits has been strong. She’s seen a lot of families get extensions to stay in shelter. The underlying issue, she said, is the acute affordable housing crisis in the region.

“I think what you’re seeing is that we have families that are coming out of situations in deep poverty, and it is very hard to get back on your feet,” she said. “It doesn’t happen overnight. It’s a long, arduous process to try and equip yourself with a job that can give you a living wage and actually get an apartment that you can afford.”

Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll addressed the longevity of stays in emergency shelter on Tuesday. She chairs a commission tasked with studying the sustainability and efficiency of the emergency housing program.

“We’ve seen families that are in a shelter for a long period of time have a much more difficult time getting out because the array of what their needs are are different than what the shelter can provide,’ she said. “So they just stay there. They just stay there and don’t really move out.”

Driscoll said the system isn’t designed to account for those situations, and the commission is exploring alternatives. “Our hope is to have a model that stays true to our values around wanting people to be housed, but also to make it operationally and fiscally sustainable to make sure we’re meeting just those needs.”

The commission has until Dec. 1 to file a report to lawmakers.

There are a lot of pieces to help get people on their feet, including work authorization paperwork, finding a job, English classes, skills training, financial literacy, childcare, transit, and then saving for and finding housing.

“Remember that that there is a whole system that needs to be in place to support someone in permanent housing, and that if any of the pieces of that cycle break down, that the ability for a family to sustain housing is compromised,” said Rabbi James Greene, CEO at Jewish Family Service of Western Massachusetts, a group that works with migrant families on legal assistance and finding permanent homes.

He explained that if finding child care is difficult, or not being able to find a way to work, everything can slow down.