STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, JAN. 10, 2006…..The Legislature’s Housing Committee on Tuesday endorsed an initiative that would send funds left over from a $25 million Hurricane Katrina relief law to help fuel local and state homelessness prevention programs.

Of the estimated $12.5 million left, $5 million would be used to repair and modernize local public housing units and $5 million would be spent on Department of Housing and Community Development programs for the homeless. About $1 million would be spent on low and moderate-income first-time buyers looking for mortgage loans. The Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance and the New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans would receive $500,000 and $250,000, respectively.

“There was an admirable outpouring of support for Katrina victims. The reality is once the cameras are gone, once the media focus on Katrina has subsided, we still have thousands of homeless families in Massachusetts,” said Sen. Brian Joyce (D-Milton), the committee co-chairman. “This is by no means going to cure our very real problem, but it’s at least a positive step.” Joyce said the legislation appears to have broad support, with at least 26 co-sponsors, and will now move on to Senate Ways and Means. Homeless prevention and housing advocacy groups testified before the committee in support of the bill (S 2313).

“Hurricane Katrina exposed the real, raw issues of poverty,” said Grace K. Carmark, executive director of the Central Massachusetts Housing Alliance, a Worcester County-based nonprofit. “The ultimate answer is to create more affordable permanent housing opportunities for people earning less than fifty percent of the median income.”

Carmark told committee members that every family moved from a shelter to housing costs $4,000 but saves $15,000 in shelter costs. Funding cuts have raised fears that as shelters become gridlocked, more homeless families will once again be housed in hotels, she added.

Currently, 74 families, with 137 children, are staying in Worcester emergency family shelters. Homeless prevention advocates at today’s hearing cited a University of Massachusetts report from 2000 that estimated there are 10,000 homeless people statewide.

“Like Katrina, it’s about system failure,” said Joe Finn, executive director of the Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance. “What we’ve lacked in the past is the political wherewithal and a sense of urgency.”

“The more we focus on prevention, which is more humane and cost-effective to the Commonwealth, the better off everyone will be,” said John McGah, a senior research associate at University of Massachusetts Boston’s Center for Social Policy.

Separately, the committee also heard a home-rule petition establishing a non-profit senior housing corporation in Deerfield in Franklin County, brought forth by Sen. Stanley C. Rosenberg and Rep. Stephen Kulik. Both lawmakers acknowledge the corporation is “unusual,” since it will be a quasi-public organization owned by the town. Kulik says it won’t duplicate the resources the regional housing authority provides.

The private non-profit corporation has a start-up cost projected at around $60,000, which is to come out of the municipal budget.

“What it will enable the town to do is receive donations and gifts and appropriate money from the municipal budget into a fund that would allow assistance to senior citizens in town for home improvements,” Rep. Kulik said. “The town has come up with this idea as a way to keep more elderly residents in Deerfield.”

The work will be on existing senior homes, installing grab bars, raising toilets, and providing better lighting. It won’t duplicate the resources the regional housing authority provides, Kulik said.

The Housing Committee also heard an update on guidelines released last November for Chapter 40B, a state affordable housing law. The new guidelines are not legally binding, according to Clark Ziegler, the executive director of the Massachusetts Housing Partnership.

“This is advice, nothing more,” said Ziegler, who is also the principal author of the report, but added that all four state agencies involved with Chapter 40B have signed off on it. “The state agencies are speaking in one voice in terms of policy,” he said, and the Housing Appeals Committee has cited the guidelines in some recent decisions.

The guidelines outline a uniform appraisal process for 40B sites, and put standards in place for what can make a 40B development “uneconomic,” which would include projected sales exceeding development costs by less than 15 percent. The guidelines also encourage communities to adopt local affordable housing plans to help engage in a dialogue with developers and zoning boards of appeals.

“In terms of acrimony over land value, it’s not going to make it go away, but it’s going to clear up a few issues,” he said.