March 10, 1990

Dear friends,

Please take a moment to read this letter. It's very important.

Last Friday the Committee on Human Services of the D.C. City Council cut $6 million from the Emergency Shelter budget for this fiscal year and $13 million next year. These cuts affect only families with children. While no one would argue that spending millions of dollars on rat-infested hotel for homeless families is reasonable or appropriate, or that 3,000 units of vacant public housing in the city makes sense, the City Council has offered no alternatives to those who will be driven back onto the streets and no money or plan to renovate existing public housing. Unless we act now, hundreds of families will soon be without shelter.

Twenty-two of us are fasting. We will conduct a vigil at the District Building (14^th and E Streets NW) around the clock and mount a petition drive during our stay there. The vigil will begin Monday, March 12 at 9 AM and remain there until March 20, when the full Council is scheduled to vote on the Emergency Shelter budget.

We need your help.

It is urgent that the council know that balancing the budget on the backs of homeless babies is unacceptable. Since the budget has already passed the Committee on Human Services, only public pressure can stop it from passing the full Council. There isn't much time.

We ask you to do one or more of the following: Call or write your Councilmember and H.R. Crawford, who chairs the Committee on Human Services. (Remember that letters might not get there in time, so please send telegrams, if you can). Urge others to do the same. Gather signatures on petitions.

Please join us at the District Building and participate in the vigil. Write letters to the local papers, expressing your concern.

Join us at a Rally in front of the District Building, at 10 AM, Tuesday, March 20.

We must speak out!

We will be heard!

425 Second Street, NW Washington D. C. 20001 202-1909