The elections in Amherst are over, and, given the results, it looks like the town will continue to provide some town funds for several human service agencies. On the whole, I think this is a good thing, although as Amherst’s budget problems have grown worse I’ve been back and forth on this issue myself.
Why? Because our neighbors in other towns don’t help out. Individuals and families contribute, either by volunteering or sending a check or through United Way, but other towns do not contribute tax dollars to these agencies, which include the Amherst Survival Center, the Men’s Resource Center, Not Bread Alone, Family Outreach, Big Brothers / Big Sisters, and the Center for New Americans. (Cities like Northampton often designate some of their federal funds, as Community Development Block Grants, to these agencies. ) I think they should. To me, it’s very similar to the way cities have ended up carrying the burden of many of our social problems, especially homelessness.
For several years now, the mayors of Springfield, Holyoke, and Northampton have been getting together to point out that the large number of homeless people they are trying to cope with do not all “belong” to those cities. Instead, people who have become homeless often gravitate to the larger communities which are home to both shelters, meals programs, and other people who might provide some food or money, at least. If someone living in, for example, Leverett, Pelham or Shutesbury, becomes homeless, how long would that person hang out in downtown whichever? Often there isn’t even a coffee shop to get warm in and maybe receive some food from a kind restaurant owner or customer. Even the library isn’t open every day. So most likely, unless the person prefers to live in a tent in the woods, as some do, he or she will move to the streets of a larger town, like Amherst or Northampton, or, maybe, eventually, to a city.
Similarly, poverty is concentrated, especially in the towns and cities that have low-cost housing, whether as official “affordable housing” units or as relatively inexpensive apartments (as in Sunderland). According to the Survival Center, while they have clients from all over Franklin and Hampshire counties, and even as far away as Holyoke, approximately 60% of their clients live in Amherst. That’s hardly a surprise, since Amherst is the home of the Center, has the biggest concentration of affordable housing in Hampshire County east of the Connecticut River, and is the hub of the bus routes.
The people I talked to at the Men’s Resource Center and the Center for New Americans said that some of the people who come to their groups in Amherst do so because that’s where they work, so it’s more convenient than similar groups that meet elsewhere, including Northampton and Greenfield. One of the agencies, Big Brothers / Big Sisters, makes a special commitment to serving children and families in Amherst because of the town funding, but most of these agencies can’t – shouldn’t -- select their clients.
Economic problems like poverty, hunger and homelessness, occur throughout our region; other social problems, like domestic violence and dysfunctional families , occur throughout society. They are not limited to any town or any income group. As a society we have not figured out efficient and humane ways of helping each other deal with crises or chronic problems. State and federal programs never quite meet the needs, and often seem so remote as to be out of touch with the realities of people’s lives. For decades, suburbs have been able, if they wanted, to let the problems concentrate in the cities, where, because our governments don’t cross boundaries well, they seemed to be someone else’s problem. The mayors of our cities have called on the whole Pioneer Valley to participate in solving the twin problems of homelessness and the shortage of affordable housing; they are right. Amherst, on a smaller scale, is in a similar relationship with many of our neighboring towns.
Given the resistance to paying more for ambulance services subsidized by Amherst, I don’t expect a sudden surge of line items in town budgets for human service agencies. But I do think a common recognition of our obligations to each other makes sense, and the humane impulse should not stop at town borders.