According to Cambridge officials, the Bush administration required cities to create such a plan in order to continue receiving federal funding for homelessness services.

In an indication of the challenges facing the city, the plan devotes four pages towards outlining “Obstacles and Caveats”—and only a page and a half to new municipal initiatives.

Among its few new recommendations, the plan calls for a “public education campaign to help residents understand the human side of homelessness.” And it proposes the construction of new housing units for low-income individuals, although it offers few further details.

HUNT FOR A HOME

But the city faces a Sisyphean struggle in its bid to provide affordable housing for its residents.

Of all U.S. cities, Cambridge experienced the fastest growth in real estate prices from 1980 to 2000, according to Professor of Economics Edward L. Glaeser. The median price of a home in Cambridge—adjusted for inflation—increased 183 percent during that period. And the problem of skyrocketing housing costs exists throughout the Greater Boston area.

Kaye, the Brighton painter, says he devotes 70 to 80 percent of his income to rent and utilities, paying close to $1,000 a month for a one-bedroom apartment. To cover food costs, Kaye, who does not own a car, says he treks to churches and community centers for free dinners—sometimes walking nearly two hours in each direction.

His hunt for a free meal parallels the increasingly arduous quest that low-income Hub residents face in finding affordable housing.

Under the three-decade-old Section 8 program, the federal government provides housing vouchers that cap rent payments at 30 percent of recipients’ incomes. But the waiting list for the popular program has grown so long that local authorities will no longer accept new applications.

Joubert, who says she has been homeless since 1993, has entirely given up any hope of obtaining a voucher.

Shelters find themselves crunched for space as they struggle to house those who can’t find homes of their own. Yi-Chen “Lilly” Zhang ’07, a supervisor at UniLu, says that overcrowding and a lack of resources have even caused fights to erupt among those who sleep at the shelter.

“There are some instances where people get really rowdy because they just can’t take it anymore,” Zhang says.

And the squeeze could worsen if Cambridge officials cut the number of voucher recipients—which they say may be necessary after the federal government reduced Section 8 funding to the city by $1.2 million last year.

“If we continue to have a federal administration this hostile to funding programs that support low-income folks and housing-related services, we’re likely to be nowhere in 10 years. We’ll have increased rather than decreased homelessness,” says Ellen M. Semonoff, assistant city manager for human services, who served on the city committee that produced the plan.

Reflecting Semonoff’s frustration, the plan devotes substantial ink to blasting Bush administration budget cuts.