Reps. Frost, Ramirez, Tlaib, Jayapal, and Ansari Urge HUD to Deny Any Funding Requests for Government-Run Homeless Camps

By Alayna Calabro, NLIHC Senior Policy Analyst 

Representatives Maxwell Frost (D-FL), Delia Ramirez (D-IL), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), and Yassamin Ansari (D-AZ) sent a letter to HUD Secretary Scott Turner on January 29 urging HUD to deny any request for federal funding for Utah’s plan to create a government-run homeless camp or any similar project. The representatives urge HUD to work with Congress to support proven solutions to homelessness. 

Utah’s plan would move 1,300 people experiencing homelessness to a proposed homeless campus on the outskirts of Salt Lake City. State planners stated they would use “stern measures” to move people to the remote site and force them to undergo treatment. Officials have not expanded what the proposal calls “work-conditioned housing” or disclosed if sobriety requirements could result in people losing subsidized housing and returning to homelessness. The plan has prompted significant concerns over potential civil liberties violations, forced labor, and harmful health conditions. 

HUD spokeswoman Kasey Lovett stated that officials are aware of the Utah plan and are “encouraged” by its direction. In the letter, the representatives urge HUD to reject any requests to fund Utah’s plan or any similar projects across the country. “The Utah proposal to expand this hostile approach into forced detention, treatment, and displacement of the unhoused will not solve the homelessness problem in America, and it will increase the trauma, stigma, and barriers to a good life that our neighbors face,” state the representatives. 

Read the letter here. 

Read more about Utah’s plan to create a government-funded homeless detention camp here and here.