In 1989 seventy-five percent of the homeless budget was spent on expensive hotel rooms for homeless families. Prior to 1980 the District government operated it's own family shelters at a considerably lower cost. Amid opposition from many advocates, those more humane facilities were closed in favor of high-cost contracts with hotels.

Initiative 17 DID NOT create waste and mismanagement.

Initiative 17 provides that only District residents are entitled to shelter. In a study prepared for the District Government it was learned that 80% of the District's homeless have been here for five years or more.

In 1987, The National Coalition for the Homeless released a study that showed that more than 50 cities across the U.S. considered themselves the Mecca for the homeless because they had shelter programs.

Initiative 17 DID NOT create a Mecca for homeless people.

Sixty-five percent of the residents at D.C.'s largest shelter for single men work jobs. Their problem is not programs, it is the lack of affordable housing.

Most families being housed in family shelters receive some form of assistance, or work jobs, they simply cannot find housing that they can afford.

Initiative 17 DOES NOT warehouse people, it keeps people alive while we wait for long-term solutions.

Only .9 percent of D.C. taxpayers dollars went to the homeless budget in 1989.

Initiative 17 DID NOT bust the budget.

SAVE INITIATIVE 17! VOTE FOR REFERENDUM 005!