Gov. Healey will seek access to remaining pandemic-era surplus dollars to cover shelter costs, top budget writer says
Gov. Maura Healey will attempt to drain the rest of a one-time account filled with money leftover from the pandemic to cover the remaining cost of the emergency shelter system this fiscal year, her top budget writer said this week.
Beacon Hill Democrats approved $500 million to pay for the state-run shelter system in fiscal year 2025 even though the Healey administration has said spending is expected to surpass $1 billion. Funds are projected to run out by the start of the year without another monetary injection.
In a call with reporters Friday afternoon, Administration and Finance Secretary Matthew Gorzkowicz said budget writers were still working out when to file a spending bill that taps into the one-time account but acknowledged the need to submit a proposal before money dries up in January.
A spending bill is necessary because the state budget Healey signed into law earlier this summer only allocates $325 million for the shelter system while relying on $175 million in surplus dollars to pay down other costs.
With another $47.5 million expected to carry over from the last fiscal year, the Healey administration said it is facing a roughly $470 million spending gap in fiscal year 2025, according to data presented to a state commission last month.
As costs have mounted for the state-run shelter system amid an influx of migrants, the Healey administration has consistently pushed for access to a temporary account the Legislature created during the pandemic to store one-time savings from year-end revenue surpluses in fiscal years 2021 and 2022.
But top Democrats in the Legislature have routinely expressed hesitancy with emptying the account because the dollars can only be used once.
Healey’s plan to use the rest of the money could run into resistance depending on when she files the spending bill.
The Legislature concluded formal sessions for the year earlier this month and is meeting in informal sessions for the rest of the year where any one lawmaker can block advancing legislation.The governor could wait until the start of the 2025-2026 session in January to file the bill but might find herself running short on time and cash to pay for shelter services.
Gorzkowicz said he is staying mindful of the legislative calendar and plans to have conversations with top Democrats in the House and Senate this fall.
Healey has said if lawmakers do not give her access to the remaining surplus dollars her administration will be forced to reduce the number of people in shelters, end or limit the amount of overflow shelters, and curtail or end “additional services.”
The push for the dollars comes as budget writers predict the emergency shelter system will cost taxpayers more than $1 billion in each of the next several fiscal years.
If those projections hold true and lawmakers hand Healey the rest of the surplus dollars, the account will run out of money by the end of fiscal year 2025, her administration has said.
That means the state’s general budget could be in line to absorb the massive cost of the shelter system in fiscal year 2026 unless lawmakers find another source of funding or drastically cut services, the Healey administration said in a report last month.
House Speaker Ron Mariano suggested in March that broad budget cuts could be on the table when lawmakers sit down to draft the fiscal year 2026 budget if different dollars cannot be found to support the shelter system.
“Every program that we fund is susceptible to being tapped to fund the shelter program. Not in this budget but in the next because there will be no help coming,” he said at the time. “There’s no help coming. The federal government can’t get its act together.”
In an attempt to control costs, Healey has implemented a series of restrictions on the emergency shelter program, which was initially set up under a 1980s law designed to provide temporary housing to families with children and pregnant women.
That includes limiting time in the system to nine months — a move that was met with criticism from advocates who said the average length of stay for families is roughly one year. The governor also put in place a 7,500-family cap on the system in a decision that was unsuccessfully challenged in court last year.
In a controversial step last month, Healey limited families’ stays in overflow shelters to five days and barred them from accessing the larger system for six months if they take advantage of the option.
The overflow shelter rule took effect over the protests of advocates who argued it would leave families sleeping outside.
The expected $1 billion spend on the shelter system this fiscal year reflects the administration’s best cost estimate even with the restrictions in place, Gorzkowicz said Friday.
from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/dHunGvt
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