Here & Now

Homelessness Funding Works through Legislature

Frederica Freyberg:
The problem of homelessness in Wisconsin is getting sharp attention at the state level. Eight new legislative bills calling for nearly $4 million in new spending to combat the issue are in progress. And the governor himself announced he will chair the Interagency Council on Homelessness, created two years ago. Tony Evers also included the same provisions in funding in his proposed two year budget. Tonight ahead of a legislative discussion on the topic, we revisit a clip from a short film aired here first, “No Place Like Home” features the story of a once homeless teen. Jivonte Davis tells how quickly the security of housing can vanish.

Jivonte Davis:
One night, it was like, I had a basketball tournament in Minnesota. So I went to Minnesota for three days. You know, my phone was off so I couldn’t contact my mom or anything. And then, um, I came back from the trip exhausted, you know, wanted to go home. Get ready for school and everything. And then, it was, like, I used my key to open the door and the door wouldn’t open. I’d kind of seen the, like, the “for sale” sign up in the lawn. But, like, I never paid attention to it. And then, our neighbor from across the street came outside and was like, “Son, are you looking for your mom?” I was like, “Yeah.” She’s like, “Son, I just seen a moving truck leave here yesterday.” I called my mom and she told me that she end up losing the house while I was gone and by me and my phone being off, she couldn’t contact me and tell me. She started crying and she’s like, “We’re in Sun Prairie.” And she told me, “You can stay here or you can do what you got to do.” And I told her, “I can’t be in Sun Prairie. We don’t have transportation.” And I go, “I still have to finish school.” So I just stayed on in Madison on my own. I was staying at friends’ houses. What they call it nowadays, they call it couch surfing, where you sleep from couch to couch, from house to house. And that’s what I was doing. The transition was hard because I was so used to like, I was used to taking advantage of everything that, like, we did have when I was home. We did have, like you know, electricity, fresh water, you know, heat. I took it for granted pretty much and you never, you don’t know that until you get on your own and then it’s like, man, how am I going to pay for tonight. Or like, what am I gonna eat? Or how can I charge my phone? Like, I told myself, “One day it’s there. The next day, it could be gone.”

Frederica Freyberg:
That film by Mitch Deitz and accompanying program won first place at the prestigious Eric Sevareid awards this month.
Continuing this discussion now in tonight’s closer look, we sit down with the state Assembly majority leader to run through the spending proposals for homelessness in Wisconsin. According to a state report nearly 22,000 people experienced homelessness in Wisconsin in 2017. And nearly 3,500 of those people slept in places not meant for human habitation during winter months. The report also showed 56% of people who experienced being homeless were from outside Milwaukee, Dane and Racine Counties. With that in mind, eight legislative measures proposed the $3.75 million spending that includes increased funding toward preventing homelessness by providing short term assistance, transitional housing, affordable housing, and job skills training. The very same measures are in the government’s budget proposal. We sat down with Assembly Majority Leader Representative Jim Steineke and started by asking him to describe the measures.

Jim Steineke:
Really the focus is trying to make an impact on the homelessness problem from beginning to end of the spectrum, right. So on the front end of things, trying to keep people from experiencing homelessness to begin with by providing, in some cases, short term grants or small or low interest loans in order to get them through you a rough time so they don’t experience homelessness to begin with. To the point where they’re homeless and we’re providing more resources for shelters throughout the state, more resources for workforce training. Everything along the way to try to get people into a place where they’re more secure.

Frederica Freyberg:
You sponsored legislation that created the State Council on Homelessness. And its recommendations out of that council mirrored these legislative proposals. It’s not as though your Kaukauna district is kind of the epicenter of homelessness in Wisconsin. Why did you take the lead on it?

Jim Steineke:
Yeah, so really I guess it boils down to a couple of things. The main thing was after having spent six or eight years coming down here to Madison to work every week, and noticing the homelessness problem. Especially in my first term, how bad it was and just how visible it was in comparison to what it is in northeastern Wisconsin, it really had a pretty dramatic effect on me. But then over the course of the next few years, you just kind of become numb to it. And the homeless unfortunately become kind of part of the scenery in Madison. And once I realized that that’s what was happening in my own mind, that’s when I really started to get concerned and I really wanted to start digging in further to see what we could do to help.

Frederica Freyberg:
Governor Evers this spring announced that he will chair this council. What does that say to you about his commitment on this issue?

Jim Steineke:
I think that’s significant. I mean, obviously our past chair was Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch who did a wonderful job leading the Interagency Council over the first year and was really responsible for developing this package of legislation. I’m encouraged by the fact that he wants to lead it. We’re a little disappointed there hasn’t been a meeting called yet. And there hasn’t been an executive director hired. So that’s a little concerning. We really want to keep the momentum building on this. And that’s one of the reasons we wanted to introduce this package of legislation separately to keep this top of mind for not only legislators but people throughout the state.

Frederica Freyberg:
And yet going through the governor’s executive budget, each of the provisions in each of the bills is mirrored in that budget as well, and so what does that say to you about his commitment?

Jim Steineke:
I think that’s a significant tell as well, is that he is committed to what he is taking. He did take those recommendations and make it part of his budget. Really what we want to do by pulling those out and having hearings separately is continue that conversation, because in the absence of the Interagency Council on Homelessness meeting, there’s kind of a void in news making on the issue. So as we continue to hold hearings on these bills and media continues to cover the issue, we continue to spread awareness about the problem.

Frederica Freyberg:
Do you have some suspicion that these bills or even the provisions in the budget won’t be supported in a bipartisan way?

Jim Steineke:
No, I certainly hope not. I haven’t heard from anybody that is in direct opposition to any particular bill. So as it has been in the past, I think it will continue to be a bipartisan issue.

Frederica Freyberg:
Now advocates for homeless have said that Wisconsin had no plan on this issue for many years, unlike most other states. How far will these spending measures go to catching up toward as you say prevention in the first place and then helping those who are already without homes?

Jim Steineke:
I think it’s significant. I mean, I think the first step was the initial creation of that Interagency Council. The work that they’ve done over the course of the last year working with, a year and a half really, working with advocates to come up with these proposals was phenomenal. And now we’re going to see the results of these as we go forward. But I just remember back when we first started this initiative, where we talked to somebody from the Continuum of Care and she said that in her 10, 11 or 12 years working with the Continuum of Care, this is the first time anybody from the state has ever reached out to her to work on this issue. Which really kind of took me aback because that covers a span of both Republicans and Democrats in control, and nobody was really paying attention. It was kind of telling.

Frederica Freyberg:
How would you like to build on this effort?

Jim Steineke:
Just continue to keep the awareness amongst the public because I think all too often, people see homelessness as a Milwaukee problem or a Madison problem. They don’t realize that homelessness is in virtually every community throughout the state. It affects rural areas as well as urban areas. And there’s just not a lot of awareness about how significant the problem is, even in people’s own backyards.

Frederica Freyberg:
All right. Representative Jim Steineke, thanks very much.

Jim Steineke:
Thanks for having me.