Gov. Healey expects Massachusetts to shell out at least $915 million to shelter migrants in 2025

Emergency assistance shelters in Massachusetts — which has effectively been a sanctuary state since 2017 — are overwhelmed by migrants. Rather than address the cause of the crisis, Democratic Gov. Maura Healey's administration is instead planning to spend more taxpayer money in hopes of temporarily alleviating the symptoms.

Healey's finance and housing secretaries notified the legislature's two writing committees Monday that the projected cost of the shelters in fiscal year 2025 will be an estimated $915 million.

This ostensibly avoidable cost "includes shelter & associated services, staffing, Clinical and Safety Risk Assessment Sites, Family Welcome Centers, school district reimbursements, immigration and refugee health, community and workforce supports, and municipal support," according to the report.

The report further indicates that shelter capacity has maxed out at 7,500 families and that the $250 million in supplemental funding recently approved by the legislature will be gone in a few months' time, especially since migrant families are overstaying their welcome.

The situation has deteriorated a great deal since Aug. 8 when Healey declared a state of emergency "due to rapidly rising numbers of migrant families arriving in Massachusetts in need of shelter and services and a severe lack of shelter availability in the state." At the time, there were roughly 2,000 fewer families in the system than there are now.

In her August plea to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Healey refrained from criticizing the Biden administration over the historic influx of illegal aliens. Instead, she urged Mayorkas to "use all available executive power to remove the burdensome barriers keeping people from getting work authorizations, address our outdated and punitive immigration laws," and to flood the state with more federal funds.

The new report to the legislature from state Finance Secretary Matthew Gorzkowicz and Housing Secretary Ed Augustus indicates that the shelter system is facing a $224 million deficit in fiscal year 2024.

The Democratic administration intends to blow $700 million in surplus funds left over from the pandemic to pay down the fiscal year 2024 budget deficit, some of the 2025 migrant housing costs, and invest "in housing production and preservation to make affordable, stable housing options available to more families," reported the Boston Herald.

1,308 of the 7,541 families currently in the shelter system are being housed in the sanctuary city of Boston. The remainder are spread across roughly 80 towns and cities in groupings under 305, with Worcester reporting the second-biggest retention. The New York Times indicated in September that most newly arrived migrant families came from Haiti.

According to the state, 3,839 families in the shelter system have been put up in hotels or motels as of Dec. 18. Another 3,645 are being kept in traditional shelters; 47 are in temporary emergency shelters. The average household cost of emergency assistance reported this month was $58,570.

Scott Galvin, Woburn's Democrat mayor, told the Times, "The benefits that are bestowed on migrants make the state a very attractive destination, and without some changes, this challenge is not going to abate."

Extra to the shelter system, foreign nationals who enter the country illegally can count on Massachusetts to provide them with driver's licenses and their children with in-state tuition and state-funded financial aid. If the segregationist Democrats on the Boston city council have their way, foreign nationals will soon be able to vote in local elections as well.

Gov. Maura Healey says Massachusetts emergency shelters near capacityyoutu.be

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