City may cut $400K out of social services funding for homeless, poor
Public funds for homeless services are drying up just as the numbers of those living on the streets are on the rise.
The City of Santa Monica recently asked all 31 social service agencies it funds that help the homeless find jobs and permanent housing to apply for the lowest possible amount of funds this year.
“Our intent is whenever possible to maintain the social service program and keep in it intact and to make sure cuts don’t impact low-income people,” said Tracy Scruggs, the city’s human services supervisor. “We’ve asked them to submit proposals that take a hard look at where they can find efficiencies before we have to find the efficiencies for them.”
The city is considering cutting $400,000 of the $8.8 million it annually doles out for social services, Scruggs said.
But many of the agencies say they are already so under-funded that finding room for more cuts is next to impossible.
The Venice Family Clinic, for example, is asking for the same level of funding it received last year, said the organization’s executive director, Elizabeth Foyer.
“Cutting back really isn’t an option because we are already providing over and beyond what we have funding for,” Foyer said. “There’s no where to cut.”
The clinic already treats more patients than it receives funding for, she said.
The number of homeless in Santa Monica seeking assistance from locally-funded social service agencies rose by more than one-third during the past year, according to an annual city audit. In the last census — taken in 2000 — the city found that there are between 900-1,200 people living on Santa Monica streets every day.
Ocean Park Community Center, the largest provider of social services and job training to the poor and homeless, has already lost a $100,000 federal grant, according to John Maceri, the organization’s executive director. And more funding is expected to be lost down the road, he said.
The organization is likely to see a 10 percent cut in funding from Los Angeles County and a possible five percent cut from Santa Monica, Maceri said. About $3.5 million of OPCC’s total operating budget of $5 million comes from public sources. Any decline in that funding could be disastrous for the organization, Maceri said.
52B,“It’s a lot when you realize that represents real services being cut for real people,” Maceri said.
Step Up on Second, a Santa Monica provider of mental health care to the poor and homeless, has lost a $35,000 grant, according to its executive director Todd Lipka. That organization is also facing a 10 percent loss of county funds and a five percent drop in funding from Santa Monica.
More than 83 percent of Step Up on Second’s $3 million total annual operating budget comes from public sources. Without the same level of funding, Lipka fears some people may have to go without treatment.
“It may mean waiting a bit longer for treatment or trying to identify individuals with the greatest need and prioritizing our clients,” he said. “We’re assuming we are going to have to make cuts. We’re just not sure how much.”
At the Venice Family Clinic, funding levels were briefly threatened and then restored, Foyer said. For the time being, she said the group faces losing money from Santa Monica only.
“The need is growing and growing and with each level of government cutting services, we have more and more people coming to see us,” she said. “We can’t absorb any cuts.”
Many of the social service agencies said they will likely have to begin looking for other, non-public sources of funding to keep their programs intact.
3DF,“We’re having to find ways to make up the funding someplace else, which is very difficult,” Maceri said.
Individual donors, other non-profits and foundations have all been hit hard by the economic downturn and can’t give much more.
Maceri worries what the future holds for the homeless of Santa Monica and the Los Angeles region. More are ending up on the streets and Maceri worries there may be few places for people to turn.
“I know the business community and residential community are worried about homelessness, but with all the cuts that are coming... there’s going to be an enormous increase in those numbers,” he said. “The reality of the tremendous social impact this could have is enormous, and we all need to be worried about that.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 24, 2003. Read the original PDF.