Our Leaders Have Slashed HUD Before. We Live With the Consequences to This Day | Opinion

As the Trump administration races toward its rushed and reckless reduction of the federal workforce, Americans are rightfully concerned about its impacts. What will happen to federal workers and their families? What will become of the government services we all depend upon? And will we ever be able to put these agencies back together again?

To fully understand the consequences of cutting staff and funds from federal programs, there is a precedent. Just look at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which is reported to be anticipating drastic staffing cuts to several programs. This includes a staggering 84 percent staffing reduction to the Office of Community Planning and Development—the office that operates HUD's homelessness services, veteran homelessness, affordable housing, disaster response, and community development programs.

It's not just HUD's staff that is being cut. The agency also faces a reduction in funding, due to the full-year continuing resolution that drives the FY25 federal budget—a budget that will force HUD to do this year's work with last year's budget, no matter the rising cost of housing across the nation. This represents a cut to HUD's funding, at a time when demand for assistance is only growing.

Some may be tempted to embrace politically driven narratives about waste, fraud, and abuse. But as a former HUD staffer under three administrations, I have learned firsthand that the reality is far simpler—our leaders have been starving this department for decades.

To get to the root of this crisis, we have to look back in time, but not as far as you might think. In fact, homelessness as we know it today is an entirely modern phenomenon. If you're over the age of about 60, you remember a time when there wasn't widespread homelessness in America.

Between 1978 and 1983, HUD's budget authority was slashed by 72 percent. Much of this took place under the direction of the Reagan administration, which believed the government's housing programs were too costly and could be better served by the private market. As HUD's programs and staff were cut to the bone, critically important housing protections disappeared from thousands of households in need.

It is not a coincidence that the modern homelessness phenomenon exploded precisely during this era.

More than 40 years later, the department is still not funded appropriately to serve the growing number of Americans who are becoming homeless due to the unsustainable cost of housing. In my time leading programs at HUD, I consistently witnessed how its federal civil servants were forced to do more with less every single day.

In many cases, they've achieved what seemed almost impossible, such as the six years between 2010 and 2016 when total homelessness fell every single year, or HUD's collaboration with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs that achieved a 55 percent reduction in veteran homelessness since 2010.

But the unfortunate truth is that HUD's budget never recovered from the cuts of the '70s and '80s. Although Congress has increased funding for HUD programs for several years, the budget still is not scaled at even close to the nation's needs. And while providers, houses of worship, and philanthropic organizations have consistently done their part, none of them will ever have the resources to fill the gap left by the federal government's retreat from a fully staffed and funded HUD.

Today, we need HUD more than ever. In 2024, homelessness reached the highest point in the history of HUD's record keeping, with sizable increases in total homelessness, chronic homelessness, family homelessness, and unsheltered homelessness.

Meanwhile, the nationwide affordable housing crisis persists without any adequate form of federal intervention. The National Low Income Housing Coalition reported that the nation has a shortage of 7.1 million units of affordable and available housing for those at the lowest incomes.

As a result, we are witnessing an unprecedented number of people entering homelessness systems for the first time—a staggering average of approximately 19,000 people every single week in 2023.

Make no mistake—if we once again slash HUD's budget and workforce, we will undoubtedly see a catastrophic increase in homelessness. And if history is any indicator, the consequences will persist for decades—impacts felt not only in Washington, D.C., but in struggling communities, red and blue alike, all over this country.

As a nation, we can't afford that.

The federal civil servants at HUD have a job to do, and it's a vital one for our nation and our communities. We need to let them do their jobs.

Ann Oliva is CEO of the National Alliance to End Homelessness.

The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.