The growing quantity, heartache, and cost of families living in hotels in the Mid-Hudson

Over the past two years, civic leaders shared with Pattern for Progress their concern about a regional surge in homelessness and the rising demand for emergency temporary housing. Government and nonprofit leaders said they were particularly troubled by the large amount of first-time homelessness and the unusually high number of families with children in emergency placements. In addition to their obvious concerns for the wellbeing of adults and children who were displaced from their homes, officials also noted the growing public cost brought on by the need to shelter more people in hotels and motels.

With limited capacity in designated shelters, social service departments have historically relied on hotels and motels to provide short-term housing for people in need. Although this type of emergency placement has been common for decades, social service providers have expressed more concern recently as they watched the typical length of stay stretch from a few months to a few years. In Ulster County, for example, the average length of stay in so-called temporary housing has exceeded three years.

In response to these concerns, Pattern collected data about the demand for emergency housing and the length of stay for unhoused people and families who were living in hotels and motels in Dutchess, Orange, Sullivan and Ulster counties. We chose to focus our analysis on these Mid-Hudson counties because data suggested that the highest increases in homelessness in our region were concentrated within that four-county area.

As of the writing of this report, more than 550 families, including 588 children enrolled in public schools, were living in hotels and motels across the four counties. The number of schoolchildren living in those hotels and motels has increased by 106 percent in the past 15 years, with the largest increase coming in the two years immediately following the pandemic. State education data show that homelessness among schoolchildren is a steadily growing problem in the Mid-Hudson region. Since 2009, the total number of students counted as homeless in the four counties has grown by 1,055 to a total of 3,786. Most of them are living “doubled up” with relatives or other families, but some are also living in shelters, cars or campgrounds.

In addition to gathering the numbers, Pattern conducted more than a dozen interviews with social service leaders, housing developers, and advocates. We also spoke directly with several unhoused families who shared their stories and struggles despite working as nursing assistants, grocery store clerks, cashiers, and in other essential service-industry jobs.

The data and interviews show that families who historically paid reasonable rent for a home are now being upended by a range of variables. Pre-pandemic eviction levels are displacing more families into a post-pandemic housing market that they cannot afford. The regional housing supply has been constricted by a variety of factors. The waiting list for housing vouchers is many years long in communities where people are seeking help to pay for shelter. This reality underscores the need to dramatically increase the stock of permanently affordable housing with rents that are protected from market fluctuations.

In the pages that follow, Pattern outlines the trends and data that illustrate these challenges, the underlying causes, the costs associated with providing shelter, and civic issues associated with the spike in demand for emergency housing. We end with a call to action for our local, state, and federal government officials who have the authority to design a better system that ensures all our neighbors have access to housing that is safe, stable, and truly affordable.