For months, Central Florida leaders have warned of a tidal wave of homelessness once an eviction ban expires at year’s end. But local homeless shelters are already seeing the first casualties of the COVID-19 recession show up at their doors.
And many of newly homeless are single mothers or couples with young children.
“First of all, the moratoriums don’t help people who’ve been living paycheck to paycheck in our hotels because they don’t have a lease. And they don’t have the documentation required to get rental assistance,” said Lisa Portelli, senior advisor on homelessness and social services to Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer. “Those are the most vulnerable.”
At the Coalition for the Homeless of Central Florida, president and CEO Allison Krall has witnessed a significant rise in the number of people who report being homeless for the first time — now over 40 percent of those seeking help.
“I think in light of where things are with the economy, with the number of people who have been laid off and furloughed, I’m not shocked,” Krall said. “But it is still heartbreaking.”
The coalition’s two shelters currently house over 360 people, more than half of them women and children. LaQuinda Thomas, 31, is among them.
She arrived in early August, her 2-year-old son in tow.
A former cashier at the Amway Center, her job disappeared with the coronavirus shutdown of public sporting events and concerts. With no formal rental agreement to protect her, she made it five months before being evicted.
“I was going to reach out to family, but everybody has their own situation, so there was no help,” she said. “The last option was to come here.”
Her sister, who works at a restaurant, had her hours cut. She wound up at the coalition, too.
The coalition was able to house both of them, but other local shelters are full or nearly so.
“We’re at capacity,” said Majorie Pierre, an executive with The Salvation Army in Orlando. “Unfortunately, we have even less room in the women’s housing, where we’ve had to limit the number of families because of social-distancing requirements. For the men, we had a little more flexibility, but with an influx of individuals we’re full there, too.”
In all, the agency is housing about 300 men, women and children each night. Another 280 people are now living at the Orlando Union Rescue Mission’s two shelters in Orlando, both of which are also full.
“The first two months of the pandemic, we didn’t admit any new guests in order to protect the ones who were already here,” said Fred Clayton, the mission’s president and CEO. “But since then we’ve had an increase particularly in the number of single moms and [couples] with children. Now we’re at capacity again — and we have a waiting list.”
Three weeks ago, he took in the last family — a couple with five children, all under age 10. The dad, a construction worker, had lost his full-time work. Then opportunities at the labor pool dried up.
They’d been living in a rent-by-the-week motel room along the tourism corridor in Osceola County.
Clayton worries there will be many more such families in the months ahead. Tens of thousands of Central Florida’s low-wage workers have stayed housed through federal unemployment aid, CARES Act rental assistance, a statewide eviction ban and now a nationwide eviction moratorium by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that expires Dec. 31.
But at the same time that ends, so will the current CARES Act funding for rental assistance, which must be spent by Dec. 30 to avoid forfeiture.
“So just as that money runs out, the moratorium on evictions is supposed to end,” said Martha Are, CEO of the Homeless Services Network of Central Florida, which draws down federal grant funding, recruits landlords and runs an intake system to prioritize who gets into housing and when. “It’ll be over just as people need it — unless Congress extends it.”
Despite shelters being full, leaders have no desire to build more. The strategy in recent years leans on diversion programs and finding people subsidized housing within the community.
At the coalition, for instance, more than 3,000 families and individuals have been diverted from the shelter since 2018. Housing counselors meet with people seeking help and ask about options — relatives who might be able to share their home for a little extra rent money or low-cost room rentals in the community. Another coalition program helps pay for apartments and gradually lessens the subsidy as people regain their financial footing.
“We’ve got 58 families in housing today that were left homeless due to the COVID pandemic,” Krall said. “If not for that and the diversion program, there would be a lot more homeless families. But we are concerned about what lies ahead. It could be that perfect storm.”
Thomas, who just started a new cashier’s job last week, tries not to look too far down the road. She is grateful for the shelter, the day care it provides for her son, and a social worker there who counsels her on next steps.
“I have my days where I feel depressed, but then I can go to my caseworker — who is on my side 100 percent — and she gives me a little pep talk. She’ll make me feel good about myself,” Thomas said. “So I don’t give up. I’ve got my [son], so I’ve got to just keep pushing forward.”
