WASHINGTON – Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) on Wednesday led several of his House colleagues in calling on President Joe Biden and U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona to take additional steps to address housing insecurity and homelessness among K-12 students in response to a housing crisis made worse by the pandemic. Joining Rep. Bowman on the letter are Reps. Cori Bush (D-MO), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) and Mondaire Jones (D-N.Y.).

The members called on President Biden and Secretary Cardona to assist schools in exploring a full-service community school model in order to meet the social, emotional, physical, mental health, and academic needs of students. They also called for added interagency collaboration between the Department of Education, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Health and Human Services, and more in order to better support students facing housing insecurity and other challenges and to bring additional resources to schools.

“A nationwide eviction crisis is a significant threat to a safe and sustainable return to in-person learning,” the members wrote in the letter. “Until there is a comprehensive, lasting policy solution to housing insecurity in our nation, temporary eviction moratoriums are lifesaving albeit temporary fixes. The shorter and more restrictive they are, the less meaningful. The 60-day eviction moratorium extension with tighter restrictions is a positive development in that it will ensure many – though not all – children and their families can stay in their homes. However, it also means that only a few short weeks after students return to school, our nation will be facing an eviction crisis again. It is imperative that our schools are prepared to support students and families.”

Earlier this month, President Biden announced a 60-day extension of the federal eviction moratorium that had lapsed at the end of July. However, once the extension ends in October, millions of families will again be at risk of facing eviction, homelessness, and further housing insecurity. The members argued that the impacts of that crisis on families across the country, along with the ongoing public health crisis of COVID-19 and the surge of its Delta variant, is something schools can and must be prepared to play a role in mitigating.

“The urgency for needs mapping and interagency collaboration spans several intersecting issues,” the members wrote. “In addition to the housing crisis that predates the pandemic, the number of children who are facing food insecurity, grieving the loss of a caregiver, and experiencing the isolation of being disconnected from in-person learning for an extended period of time has skyrocketed. Without reliably updated systems in place to identify emerging student needs in real-time, students and their families can suffer in isolation. Without strong networks of support in place, students and families are at risk of losing out on lifesaving resources.”

Click here to read the full text of the letter.

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