A couple of years ago, the District of Columbia passed a law modifying the Homeless Services Reform Act of 2005 to create the DC Emergency Rental Assistance Program. Given all of the other stupid ways that the government finds to spend your money, the ERAP actually wasn’t a bad idea. After all, the nature of the nation’s capital is such that it is currently the 18th most expensive place to live in the United States, though it can’t keep up with places like Manhattan and most of California. Rental rates in the District are ridiculous and it’s believed that an average of one in seven residents are behind on their rent at any given time. But the program’s popularity is also the primary driver of its biggest problem. ERAP is perpetually underfunded by a massive amount and every time they announce a new open enrollment period, they are forced to shut it down again in a matter of days. The latest enrollment period was announced on October 1st, but they had to shut it down again in just ten days. (DCist)

The need for rental assistance in the city is high. D.C.’s Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP) reopened on Oct. 1 after closing in March due to the volume of applications. But by Oct. 10, the program closed again, due to high demand, according to an announcement on the portal. ERAP will reopen for new applications on Jan. 1, 2024…

For the past several years, ERAP has run out of funding long before the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30. While the program is supposed to be available year-round, an influx of requests last year drained the budget and led to officials cutting off further applications after only five months. Advocates such as the Fair Budget Coalition called for D.C. to increase funding for the program, but the FY 2024 budget holds funding steady at $43 million.

The program will not open for enrollment again until January of next year. But even during the roughly ten days that it was open last month, the online portal that the vast majority of people use to apply for help was unavailable. On October 4 and 5 the site was down for multiple hours and on October 6 the home page displayed an “Under Maintenance” graphic. So the program was really only open and operational for a few days before fully closing down again.

We should be able to sympathize a little with the District’s government because their budget is marginal on the best of days despite levying steep taxes. It’s not a simple feat for them to find more than the $43 million they currently pump into ERAP every year. But it’s also important to balance the logistics and financing questions against the fundamental concept of fairness in terms of DC’s residents.

It’s not that I’m fundamentally opposed to all government assistance programs. There are plenty of people out there who need some help, particularly among the lower income groups. But if the government (at any level) is going to offer a program to assist people with one of the fundamental requirements of modern living such as housing, that program should be available to all qualifying individuals equally.

ERAP currently requires people to be below a particular income level based on the whether someone is applying singly or as a family. They also have to be able to demonstrate that they are behind on their rent and potentially in danger of eviction and/or homelessness. There are obviously many people in the District at any given time who qualify. But only a relative handful will wind up being enrolled based on how lucky they were when attempting to apply. Everyone else is left waiting for some sort of magical rental fairy to show up online and grant them a wish.

Perhaps in the interest of fairness, DC should abandon ERAP and divert those funds to creating more affordable housing. And while I can’t believe I’m about to say this, it may be time to discuss whether or not the federal government should be setting up some sort of pool of funding to make the program more comprehensive. After all, having a capital city is a Constitutional requirement and people obviously need to live and work there. Given how much money Congress flushes away and magically prints for everything else across the planet, a few hundred million to make the city a bit more affordable probably would be far down the list of wasteful uses of taxpayer dollars.