QuickTake:

Lane County will have 60 fewer shelter beds amid a shortfall in state funding for homeless services. Oregon Housing and Community Services officials turned down a request from Lane County and other counties to ask state lawmakers for emergency funding. 

Lane County homeless shelters will have about 60 fewer beds that serve people year-round after the state housing agency has turned down the county’s request to seek emergency funding from lawmakers. 

Lane County officials notified homeless service providers about the development Tuesday and released a list of trimmed services Wednesday, Nov. 19. The cuts leave the county’s state-funded homeless shelters with 514 beds, down from 574. 

Besides 60 fewer beds, the county also will have at least 200 fewer beds at the Egan Warming Centers, which are activated when nighttime temperatures are forecast to drop below 30 degrees. Shelters also lost funding for about 32 full-time positions, many of them caseworkers who provide services that connect people to other aid, such as affordable housing or recovery houses during a journey out of addiction.

As a result, there are “little to no housing-focused supports for shelter residents, resulting in a focus on simply meeting basic needs and maintaining shelter operations,” the county said in its Wednesday press release.

“I wanted to share that we unfortunately learned today that the e-board (emergency board) request submitted by Lane County and other Oregon counties asking for increased shelter funding is ‘not being considered at this time’ due to the overall revenue shortfall being faced by the state,” James Ewell, the county’s homelessness and community action manager wrote in an email to providers. “We will continue to look for opportunities to advocate for funding moving forward.”

In an Oct. 27 letter, Lane County asked Oregon Housing and Community Services Director Andrea Bell to submit a request for $7.7 million to the Legislature’s emergency board, for consideration to avoid cuts. The emergency board allocates funds when the Legislature is not in session. 

Multnomah, Benton and central Oregon counties joined that request, which sought $24 million total. For county officials, the state agency’s involvement was crucial because counties cannot directly submit a funding request to the Legislature’s emergency board. 

In their letter seeking emergency funding, Lane County officials said their funding allocation for shelters and related services dropped from $15 million in fiscal year 2025 to $7.6 million in fiscal year 2026, which started in July. 

The counties’ request to the state said the state funding allocations are based on “outdated data that does not reflect actual shelter growth and operational costs.” 

“Without corrective action, hundreds of shelter beds, and the people who rely on them, will be lost this fiscal year,” the letter said. 

But also in October, the Legislative Fiscal Office asked state agencies, including OHCS, to submit proposed 5% budget reductions, Delia Hernández, a spokesperson for the agency said in an email. Shelter funds were not targeted on that latest list of proposed cuts, Hernández said.

Asked if the state agrees with the counties’ contention about “outdated data,” OHCS declined to directly address the question. However, the agency said it “needed to use one consistent approach for determining statewide need” for the agency’s budget request and needed to finish that work by the summer of 2024 to meet legislative deadlines. 

“OHCS has continued to work with local impacted regions to determine potential pathways and solutions given these budget realities,” Hernández said in an email.

In Lane County, that budget reality means delays in programs that can serve additional people.

The nonprofit St. Vincent de Paul Society of Lane County planned to offer an 11-bed medical respite service for people exiting the hospital who need care. 

If Lane County had received the expected state funding and relayed it to providers, “that would mean that we could move forward with opening the medical respite shelter that we had anticipated,” said Bethany Cartledge, executive director of St. Vincent.

More than 800 people are on the nonprofit’s waiting list for 410 Garfield Safe Sleep Site, which has tents, and 310 Garfield Safe Sleep Site, where people can park vehicles and sleep.

Cartledge said the organization isn’t giving up on that project or pursuing any other needs it comes across in the future. 

“You hope for the best, but you prepare for the worst and plan for the worst,” Cartledge said.

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Ben Botkin covers politics and policy in Lane County. He has worked as a journalist since 2003, most recently at the Oregon Capital Chronicle, where he covered justice, health and human services and documented regional efforts to combat fentanyl addiction. Botkin has worked in statehouses in Idaho, Nevada, Oklahoma and, of course, Oregon. When he's not working, you'll find him road tripping across the West, hiking or surfing along the Oregon Coast.