Funding caps to close center

A social services office that aids the homeless will close July 15 despite Clark County commissioners expressing a desire earlier this week to save it.

A rigid funding cap forbids additional local tax money from being spent this year on certain social programs and staffing, including an office at the Fertitta Community Assistance Center, said Nancy McLane, the county's social services director.

McLane, who sits on the Southern Nevada Regional Planning Coalition's homelessness committee, spoke about her agency's plight Thursday.

Social Services is cutting all 31 of its part-time workers, including four who staff the Fertitta office, as well as 23 percent of its full-time employees to help offset the $9.3 million loss from the Legislature's revenue grab, McLane said.

She estimated that lost funding will lead to 2,000 to 3,000 people joining or returning to the homeless ranks.

"The impacts obviously are as severe as we expected," McLane said.

The Fertitta office must close as planned unless there's a sudden infusion of donations or outside grants, she said. No matter how willing commissioners are to divert money from other departments to save Fertitta's staffing, the law handcuffs them.

A statute limits most of the agency's funding to the property tax rate, she said, explaining that the legislative tax grab was a double whammy.

Not only did the agency lose $9.3 million when the state took 4 cents from the property tax rate, but the agency's funding cap was lowered because it's tied directly to the reduced tax rate, McLane said.

County leaders can replace the $2.4 million that the agency aims to cut for elderly services because those programs are not subject to the cap, she said. But the remaining $7 million loss in non-medical services to the homeless and destitute will be difficult to regain because of the cap, she said.

The diminished funding is compounded by ballooning demand for homeless assistance in the recession, McLane said. Last year, the county housed 82 percent of homeless people, and much of that progress will be wiped out.

Deputy Police Chief Gary Schofield, a committee member, said putting 3,000 people on the street will add to the Metropolitan Police Department's workload.

Still, police officers won't arrest homeless people just to clear street corners, Schofield said. Those who used the Fertitta office must be transported to the nearest offices so they don't have to walk 2.5 miles in the heat, especially children, he said.

Schofield said he doesn't know where county leaders will squeeze out more money to help the homeless, given that sales tax and gaming revenues are down.

"There is no magic pot of money," Schofield said.

Rose Ann Miele, also a committee member, said some residents will contend that social services must take its budget cuts like everyone else. But she argued that increasing the homeless population will have unforeseen medical and law enforcement costs.

"Until it kicks people in the head and maybe starts overflowing in their backyards ... nobody is going to do anything," Miele said.

Contact reporter Scott Wyland at swyland@reviewjournal.com or 702-455-4519.