Morano asks if DSS tracks shelter nights due to administrative delays
Morano asks whether DSS tracks additional shelter nights caused by administrative delays and how many households have an identified apartment but await final approval. French says DSS does not have that data now and will look into it, including possible shelter cost estimates.
Let's say there's a family in a shelter that has found an apartment, and the landlord is ready, the family's ready, but the application is sitting somewhere in the city's approval process.
Is DSS tracking how many additional nights?
People spend in shelters specifically because of administrative delays?
We do not have that data available at the moment.
We will look at our systems to see, but that is not a data point I have today.
So I don't want to.
And just to, I'm sorry, just to add there, and again, my colleagues can correct me if I'm wrong.
But the...
That process is the process we've been talking about that's ranging from around 24 days to 28 days.
And so it's a small piece, at least to my understanding, of the overall process.
And so I think we certainly can know if there are...
What we're giving you are averages, right?
There will be cases where it goes above that.
I don't know that we would consider that an administrative challenge.
There are back and forth that need to happen in order for us to process appropriately.
If we don't know how long, perhaps we know how many, can you tell us how many households currently have an identified apartment but are waiting for final city approval?
We don't have that with us today, but we can look at the data and get back to you with what we have.
When you do get that, if you could also include some sort of estimate or calculation about the additional shelter expenditures that taxpayers are footing the bill for associated with that waiting period.
We'll look into that and see what can be estimated there.
Okay.
Thank you, Councilman.