When the system Fails Families: States Must Fix Broken Housing Assistance Before More Children End Up Homeless

             

     Growing up, my mother and I learned firsthand what happens when Americans "safety nets" fail the people who need them most. After being kicked out of both my grandparents and great grandmothers homes we bounced from place to place with nothing but garbage bags stuffed with clothes. 

    Our car the one place we knew we could always return to, which always smelled like gasoline and old fries. It wasn't a vehicle anymore. It was a bedroom. Through it all of that, my mother was a shield. But no amount of strengths can replace a system that refuses to function.

    This wasn't just misfortune. It was the predictable result of a housing assistance system buried in federal red tape and state-level mismanagement. According to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, federal housing programs suffer from "Significant delays", Outdated processing systems or Unreliable wait list data.

        

 Families wait months even years for help. By the time a parent reaches the top of a federal waitlist they may already be homeless. State-run programs aren't any better. Journal Of Affairs talks about misallocated funds, slow approvals, eligibility errors. Bureaucracy grows while families suffer then children have to pay the highest price.

 

    People argue that the solution is to give the federal government more authority over housing assistance. But federal agencies have decades of evidence proving the opposite they move slower, they lost paper work, also mismanage funding then last they are to far removed from local realities. States aren't replacing federal aid they are compensating for federal failures.

 

    My mothers strength got us through something that could have destroyed us. But grit is not a housing strategy. A system that only steps in after a family becomes homeless is not a safety net its a trapdoor. Americans families deserves better. States have the power and the responsibility to fix this broken system. By cutting waste, enforcing oversight, powering local organizations and responding to families before they collapse into homelessness, states can build systems that works such as being efficient instead of bloated, local instead of distant, accountable instead of careless and focused on protecting children instead of paperwork. This is not just possible but its necessary.