With CT’s unhoused population growing, Norwalk lawmaker creates ‘End Homelessness’ caucus in legislature

Local news organizations in Portland, Maine, reported last week that the bodies of two men police identified as homeless were found frozen behind a Hannaford’s grocery store.

While over 250 miles away, state Rep. Kadeem Roberts, D-Norwalk, said tragedies like that in Portland show that homelessness affects everyone. Roberts said the people involved might deal with trauma from the incident, let alone the trauma of being homeless.

Preventing tragic outcomes and more is why Roberts, with Rep. Laurie Sweet, D-Hamden, created the first-ever End Homelessness caucus in Connecticut’s legislature, he said.

“I really just want to bridge that gap to find solutions that would help this situation,” Roberts said Wednesday. “I honestly call it a crisis now.”

Roberts said the caucus is especially dear to him because he grew up in public housing on School Street in Norwalk and saw people struggling with housing insecurity.

“I’d seen people, growing up where we’re from, homeless,” the Norwalk representative said.

Homelessness is a growing problem in Connecticut, according to Michele Conderino, chief executive officer at Open Doors, the nonprofit that offers comprehensive social services and runs the city’s emergency homeless shelter. She agreed with Roberts, and said that discovering the Portland men’s bodies was tragic.

“I don’t think you’ll ever get over an experience like that,” Conderino said.

Which is why Conderino and Roberts said it is crucial to end homelessness in Connecticut and house the state’s increasing homeless population.

The total number of homeless people in Connecticut has grown each year since 2020, according to the Connecticut Homeless Management Information System that provides interactive data about homelessness in the state. In 2024, the total number of people experiencing homelessness in the state peaked at a five-year high of 8,091.

This year, Gov. Ned Lamont’s proposed budget calls for over $90 million at the state and municipal levels for homelessness, homeless services, and homeless youth — but there is still funding needed, Roberts and Conderino said.

“For so long, it has been service providers begging our legislature to support our work and to continue to fund our work and annualize a lot of our funding, particularly cold weather funding,” Conderino said. “It’s a little silly that we have to ask every year as if it’s not going to be cold.”

During a statewide severe cold weather protocol last month, when all of Open Doors’ emergency beds were occupied, Conderino said that the state does not provide recurring or ongoing funding for cold weather emergency services, which can overburden local social service groups and prevent unsheltered homeless people from escaping the bitter cold.

There should be guaranteed annual budget line items for homelessness, Roberts said. That would help fund what he said are the top three priorities for ending homelessness and top of mind for the caucus he and Sweet launched.

“Three crucial priorities, the biggest priorities,” Roberts said. “Prevention, crisis response, and housing.”

Roberts said he will request $33.5 million for homeless service organizations in fiscal year 2025-26 to help them continue work to end homelessness in Connecticut.

It needs to happen, Conderino said, despite there being competing interests for funding.

“There are other needs out there, but we’ve emphasized that people are literally dying,” she said. “This is real. People are dying.”

In December, Conderino and others at Open Doors commemorated the lives of homeless people who had died in 2024.

Roberts said he met Wednesday morning with Conderino and leaders from other homeless service and advocacy groups around the state like Pacific House, Homes with Hope, and the Housing Collective when the groups’ leaders discussed the need for long-term continuous funding.

Roberts said to keep an eye on House Bill 5002, An Act Concerning Housing And The Needs Of Homeless Persons, as it aims to “lower housing costs, increase housing options and better support homeless persons.”

“That’s a priority,” Roberts said.

Full article at https://www.thehour.com/news/article/norwalk-ct-homelessness-roberts-sweet-legislature-20163598.php