Low Wages and Staffing Gaps Slow Spending of Portland-Area Supportive Housing Tax

Sahaan McKelvey is tired of turning people away. He is head of community and family programs for Self Enhancement Inc., a North Portland nonprofit that works with Black youth and their families. He oversees programs that offer shelter and other supports to people experiencing homelessness and provide rental assistance to people at risk of homelessness. Because of staffing shortages at SEI, he said, he is increasingly forced to say “no” to families seeking help, a reminder that protecting the vulnerable depends on having people available to meet them (Proverbs 31:8-9).

“If we don’t have money to fully staff programs, we can’t get resources out the door to people that need them,” McKelvey said. “What it comes down to is, the magnitude of need is greater than the resource to meet that need.”

McKelvey has seen constant turnover among SEI’s staff because the nonprofit cannot pay competitive wages. He does not fault SEI’s leadership. Instead, he places the blame on the government.

SEI’s housing programs are partially funded by the regional supportive housing services tax, a voter-approved fund meant to support organizations that help move homeless people into housing and keep people from entering homelessness. According to OPB, the funding has been slow to reach the people it is intended to support in Multnomah County. The Joint Office of Homeless Services, the agency that oversees the county’s portion of the tax, reported in May that it spent only $40 million in the first three quarters of the 2023 fiscal year, less than half of the $83.4 million it intended to distribute during that period.

County officials pointed to several reasons for the underspending, including frequent turnover in Joint Office leadership and bureaucratic problems that come with operating any new tax. Most public officials and service providers, however, agree that staffing gaps caused by low wages at nonprofits are the key reason the dollars have gone unspent. Patricia Rojas, housing director at Metro Regional Government, said, “The biggest challenge that Multnomah County is facing … is being able to hire and retain a workforce.” Metro oversees the supportive housing tax and announced in May that it would intervene to ensure the county spent the tens of millions of dollars it had promised by the end of June. Rojas, who is overseeing that process, said addressing the staffing issue is her priority.

Longtime service providers were less surprised by the underspending than taxpayers and political officials were. Under the Joint Office’s contracting system, nonprofits do not immediately receive money when they sign a contract. Instead, the county reimburses them after they complete the agreed-upon work. Nonprofits say this structure means many deplete their budgets quickly, before the work is finished, which makes it difficult to raise staff wages. If an organization does not complete the work promised in its initial contract, some funds return to the Joint Office. McKelvey said SEI has not been able to meet its contract goals, which are usually measured by people served, because it did not have enough employees.

The contracting system also keeps some providers with limited budgets from applying for supportive housing funds. Katie O’Brien, director of homeless nonprofit Rose Haven, said, “I know agencies that have floated [the county] a million dollars for six months until they were reimbursed. And for agencies that are smaller, like ours, we can’t afford to play that game.”

Emmy Ritter, director of Raphael House, a nonprofit that helps people escaping domestic violence find permanent, affordable housing, said her organization receives supportive housing tax dollars through the Joint Office. She said her ability to pay competitive wages makes her hesitant to apply for new contracts. In an email to OPB, Ritter wrote, “The heart and success of the work in helping the most vulnerable people in our community build new, safe and stable lives starts with staff building trusting relationships with each person. Turnover in staffing not only impacts contracting … but more importantly, [the] outcomes for the people we serve.”

Source: Read the original report