EC from DC - April 11, 2014
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Today I announced a series of extraordinary awards to help individuals and families experiencing homelessness in the entire metropolitan area. The U.S. Housing and Urban Development has made available $26,026,991 in grants to renew support for 113 local homeless housing and service programs in Missouri. Provided through HUD's Continuum of Care Program, the funding will ensure these local projects continue to serve communities most in need, and continue to provide support to the most vulnerable. Did you know?
- There are 610,042 people experiencing homelessness on any given night in the United States. Kansas City has the seventh largest homeless population per capita. 56 percent are mothers and children.
- Of that number, 222,197 are people in families, and 387,845 are individuals.
- About 18 percent of the homeless population - 109,132 - are considered chronically homeless.
- About 9 percent of homeless adults - 57,849 - are veterans. Missouri has the fourth highest percent of homeless veterans.
At a time like this, we need more affordable housing and a stronger safety net to end homelessness. When nearly sixty thousand of our veterans are now homeless, it's clear we are not doing enough. These funds will make a huge difference in our community. Housing assistance and outreach saves lives, keeps families together, and keeps people safe.
The awards to Missouri's Fifth District total $5,260,984 and are directed to thirty-one different projects, under the leadership of thirteen different lead agencies. The awardees include, but are not limited to: City of Kansas City, Catholic Charities of Kansas City-St. Joseph, reStart Inc., Community Services League, Sheffield Place, Synergy Services, and the Salvation Army.
Continuum of Care grants are awarded competitively to local projects to meet the needs of individuals and families experiencing homelessness in their community. The grants fund a wide variety of programs from street outreach and assessment to transitional and permanent housing for homeless persons and families. This life-saving funding will allow local providers in Missouri's Fifth District to continue offering permanent and transitional housing to homeless persons as well as services including job training, health care, mental health counseling, substance abuse treatment and child care.
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It was my honor to host a one hour Special Order on the House Floor to mark the 20th anniversary of the horrendous genocide in Rwanda. It remains a black mark in our world's history. In 1994, an estimated 800,000 people lost their lives in just 100 days, as they fell victim to evil, atrocities, and inaction around much of the rest of the world.
- 800,000 people, mostly ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus, died at the hands of Hutu extremists.
- This happened during a 100-day period.
- 10,000 victims were killed each day.
- 7 people per minute, on average, died.
- Thousands witnessed this indescribable violence and bloodshed.
- Neighbors attacked neighbors, teachers killed students, and in mixed-ethnicity marriages, husbands handed over their own wives – to be killed.
There have been many steps taken to remedy those efforts to exterminate the Tutsi ethnic group.
My hope is we will continue our fight for justice as the international tribunal created to judge these crimes has, to this day, delivered only 49 convictions since 1995.
If you'd like to watch Congressman Cleaver's entire Floor Speech, click here.
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We dug into some critical issues this week in my Washington office, as I was joined by several Chamber of Commerce representatives from throughout Missouri's Fifth District. We discussed the importance of moving forward in addressing infrastructure needs, and doing that by supporting funding in that area. One of the things I am staunchly opposed to in the proposed Republican budget is the cuts in transportation. Our infrastructure is crumbling in this country, and we must address this if we expect to stay economically competitive. With an estimated one in every nine bridges listed as structurally deficient, slashing some $52 billion in investments is not the way to go. It takes us backward and fails to create jobs or opportunities.
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It was a wonderful moment when my old friend, and new Taiwan Ambassador, Lyushun Shen walked into my office. Ambassador Shen began his new post in Washington in April. But we go back to the early 1990s, when I was Mayor and he was Taiwan's Consul-General in Kansas City. I look forward to many meetings in the future, where we can not only catch up, but look down the road as well for opportunities to advance economic and cultural goals throughout Missouri's Fifth District.
This week, fifth grade students from Barstow School in Kansas City embarked on a weeklong adventure to Washington, DC and Colonial Williamsburg. The students prepare for the trip with the study of U.S. history, geography and economic concepts. They gain an extensive understanding of how government works as well as citizenship skills, cultural awareness, and research methods using primary and secondary sources. During their visit, we explored Statuary Hall. This historic space was the meeting place of the U.S. House of Representatives for nearly 50 years (1807-1857). It was in this room in 1824 that the Marquis de Lafayette became the first foreign citizen to address Congress. Presidents James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, and Millard Fillmore were inaugurated here. Abraham Lincoln had his desk in a corner. We were lucky to be standing in a room with such significance. And I am lucky to have met these wonderful and special students.
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