Maine program provides rent money to families of students struggling with homelessness
Barnini Chakraborty
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A sharp increase of students in Maine going to school hungry, tired, and dirty has prompted the state to launch a first-of-its-kind program where schools can lend financial assistance to families who need help paying rent, utilities, or other bills as the state grapples with the sudden rise of students facing homelessness.
Maine’s Department of Education said there are about 2,186 students currently experiencing “housing insecurity,” up 60% compared to the past few years.
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“This marks a noticeable increase from the previous five years, which had an average of 1,384 students identified for housing insecurity,” Julie Smyth, the director of school and student supports for Maine DOE, said in written testimony provided to state lawmakers. “Students who experience homelessness face numerous barriers to education, including high rates of chronic absence, mobility, academic challenges, and trauma.”
The state does get some money from the federal government through the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, which helps school liaisons determine which children need help, though the money can’t be used to help pay the rent or mortgage. During the pandemic, that changed after schools across the country received several million dollars in federal relief to help parents who had fallen on hard times pay for temporary housing. But those funds are drying up and set to expire next year, leaving a lot of students in limbo.
Maine’s new program could be the game changer, Amelia Lyons Rukema, with the state Department of Education, said.
She believes the two-year pilot program lawmakers passed this year that allows schools to spend up to $750 per student each year on emergency assistance with rent, water bills, and other things that will keep them housed could be just the thing needed to help families stay on the right track and keep their children in school. She told Maine Public that the state program will fill a crucial gap by arming schools with the tools needed to prevent student homelessness.
Democratic state Sen. Joe Rafferty, who sponsored the measure in the state legislature, said “the reality” is that most families became homeless not because they owed an exorbitant amount of money or backpay but instead “became homeless due to small increments of money that were owed to some system, whether it was a landlord, or whatever.”
“And so we were looking for a way of, ‘How can we help? How can we assist? How can we prevent that from happening? And what are our resources?'” he added.
According to a 2020 study, nearly 75% of the state’s evictions were the result of a tenant only owing, on average, about $1,300. The study, conducted by the Maine Affordable Housing Coalition, claims that in addition to public health ramifications, evictions often cause “enormous personal trauma with significant repercussions to economic and personal well-being.”
“Eviction increases depression, suicide, and anxiety,” the study said. “It creates barriers to employment and social services. For children, it results in emotional and educational decline.”
Rukema believes the program is “going to change lives.”
“That’s what liaisons have been telling me. Every time, there’s a flood of relief that comes over them. Because they say, ‘Oh, finally, I have something I can actually do to help in these situations,'” she said.
Not everyone is as enthusiastic as Rukema.
Signe Lynch, with the organization New Beginnings, has questioned just how far $750 can go, especially as rents and inflation have continued to climb. She told Maine Public that the program can work if more people become aware of the opportunity and actively use it.
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“To be able to say, ‘Hey, you haven’t paid your bill. But you know, you have three kids in the school system. Have you looked at this program that could help you pay for this bill?’ And that would be huge, I think,” she said. “If we could have that level of community connection so that these places can point families into a resource that could help them financially.”
Not only are state leaders watching how the program works over the next couple of years, but other national groups have also taken interest and may see Maine’s approach as the one to follow.