Categories: Funding, New York State
03.11.2025
We are deeply grateful for the recognition of supportive housing in the one-house budget resolutions released by the Senate and Assembly leadership, which include significant additional investments to house and protect New Yorkers who have experienced homelessness and are at risk.
Both houses expanded on the strong foundation established by the governor in her executive budget proposal and heeded the Network’s call for $32 million to stabilize some 9,000 units established by the New York State Supportive Housing Program (NYSSHP), which has not seen a significant funding increase for almost 40 years.
This is an incredibly important step forward. Without this critical increase, these units risk coming offline, threatening at-risk families and individuals, including older adults, veterans and survivors of domestic violence, with a return to homelessness.
The Legislature also joined the governor in increasing the budget for the Empire State Supportive Housing Initiative (ESSHI.) The governor’s proposal acknowledged that the per-unit rate is too low, presenting a roadblock to production of desperately needed units and proposed increase from $25,000 to $31,000, with an additional $3,000 for those in the New York City metro area. This will certainly encourage the construction of the more than 10,000 units left in the initiative. The Assembly and Senate reflected the governor’s proposed investments.
Also important is the additional funding for the Homeless Housing and Assistance (HHAP) program, which provides capital for the desperately needed development of supportive housing. The Senate’s proposal includes $103 million in funding, on top of the governor’s $25 million addition, which they identified as a source for rehabbing woefully outdated NYSSHP properties. The Senate’s total proposed budget of $256 million doubles the size of the program, which is crucial as HHAP ran out of funds in the first four months of this year. The Assembly’s proposal adds $100 million on top of the governor’s increase, for a total of $253 million.
Finally, we join our colleagues across the human services sector in thanking the Senate and Assembly for increasing the 2.1 percent COLA proposed by the governor to 7.8 percent targeted inflationary increase, which is the level for which we have long advocated. We are particularly grateful to the Senate for including additional human services programs, such as NYSSHP, which have been inexplicably left out of past increases. The Senate’s proposal also dedicates 4% of the targeted inflationary increase to salaries.
