Mayor Bowser has consistently promised to end homelessness in D.C. However, the mayor's FY24 budget includes NO new housing voucher funding—nothing to end homelessness for those living in emergency shelter, on the street, or waiting years for housing on the D.C. Housing Authority voucher waitlist. While the mayor has chosen to pause her commitment to permanently house vulnerable D.C. residents, her administration has not paused its proposal to further harm through increased encampment clearings, terminating residents from the Rapid Re-housing Program, cutting housing/shelter funding for domestic violence survivors, and making significant cuts to the Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP).

Funding for new tenant vouchers remains a crucial need for thousands of D.C. residents seeking safe and permanent affordable housing. Despite the government's failure to utilize this year's voucher resources as quickly as it should have, the agencies are confident that all remaining vouchers will be assigned this year. Therefore, under the mayor's proposed budget, there will be no new vouchers available for unhoused residents next year. Among other things, no funding for new vouchers in FY24 will result in prolonged and increased homelessness, growing encampments, overcrowded shelters, soaring displacement, deteriorating health and safety, and lasting trauma for thousands of D.C. residents.

With such a well-resourced D.C. budget, D.C.’s lowest-income residents should not have to continue to struggle for basic resources each year. Funding housing resources is critical to achieving a just and racially equitable D.C.

Tell D.C. Council to end homelessness NOW by funding new housing vouchers in the FY24 budget!