Three days before taking office by President Donald Trump, Montgomery, Montgomery, received millions of dollars in federal financing to combat homelessness.
A month later, the highest democratic core officials say that you can’t find money.
The subsidy unknown at $ 5 million was the subject of a press conference on the Montgomery County Stofouse Fine Foreign, where democratic commissioners Neil Machija and Jamila Winder warned that without financing about 200 households were threatened with the loss of critical lend a hand, which keeps residents outside the streets.
“At the moment, the money that our community depends on – which the lives of people depend on – have not been delivered,” said Machija.
For decades, the Department of Housing and City Development awarded a housing subsidy in Montgomery, which then distracts a handful of local non -profit organizations to lend a hand unstable residents in quick resignation, rental lend a hand and other services.
In recent years, Montgomery’s unit has faced the growing problem of homelessness, and its miniature population has doubled since 2019, and tent camps appeared at the headquarters of Norristown.
On January 17, HUD granted the county a multi -million subsidy of “Continuum of Care” for the same services after a competitive auction process, according to officials. Montgomery’s county assigned a space in its annual budget so that this money would be dispersed in nine housing groups.
But as the weeks passed, the expected funds never arrived, the officials told you.
Makhija said that since then his office has received “zero communication” from HUD whether the subsidy would be delivered before the date of March 1.
Hud did not immediately ask the request for comment.
Montgomery’s county is not alone, because state and local governments question whether agencies under the recent Trump administration will provide federal funds on which they rely.
Since the office was taken up last month, Trump began to sweep the means to reduce costs in the entire federal bureaucracy with the lend a hand of Elon Musk’s government performance, reduction of departments and the uncertainty of the fate of thousands of jobs and federal agreements.
Governor Josh Shapiro at the beginning of this month filed a lawsuit by over $ 2.1 billion in federal financing In the case of energy and environmental projects, which, according to the highest democratic state official, were unconstitutional frozen or temporarily suspended. The White House will release these funds this weekAccording to the Shapiro office.
In Montgomery Makhija, he said that he did not know whether financing was unnecessary with the result of presidential activities, “supervision or incompetence” in HUD.
After the appointment of Trump, the owner of the company and the former NFL Scott Turner corner on Hud, the secretary announced that he would launch a “task -task hot” in order to eliminate “waste, fraud and abuse” at the agency.
Meanwhile, the Winder, the second highest democrat of the unit, claimed that the contract was detained because of “federal confusion.”
“The system is now broken,” said Winder, “and we are clergy by the federal government.”
Winder said that more than a third of the inhabitants, to which they will be affected by federal cuts of housing services of the Funny, just like those that are located in the Valley Youth House in Plymouth Meeting – a non -profit organization, whose funds aim to the first of March.
“Children will suffer,” said Winder. “These are real people, our friends and neighbors.”
Asked if the core officials would consider the introduction of disputes regarding HUD subsidies, Machija suggested that all options were on the table.
“We absolutely talk to our lawyer,” said the Commissioner, although he hoped that HUD would snail-paced down the money voluntarily before lawyers got involved.
“We ask today that the federal government maintains the end of the contract.”
