Scranton faces affordable housing crisis

Julie Dunphy
·2 min read

SCRANTON, LACKAWANNA COUNTY (WBRE/WYOU) — The affordable housing crisis is hitting families across the country, including here in northeastern Pennsylvania. The City of Scranton is focusing on creating housing for seniors and families.

Those talks are a part of the city’s unsheltered task force that’s made up of multiple agencies.

“We have a housing crisis, underneath the umbrella of housing crisis is homelessness, unsheltered. That’s people living in tents people living in cars people living in a unit with a family or many other families,” said Mayor Cognetti.

Mayor Paige Cognetti heads the City of Scranton’s Unsheltered Task Force.

It was created to connect the city’s service providers including health care providers, to address the city’s rise in homelessness.

“Right now we’re looking to see what would the wish list be in terms of shelters. We don’t have enough family shelter beds we know that,” Mayor Cognetti explained.

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The city’s Weston Field House is currently used as the Code Blue shelter during the winter months.

With a capacity of approximately 30 beds, it was utilized for 50 nights this winter, each night full.

Mayor Cognetti says the task force would like to create or build both a family shelter and a separate emergency shelter that’s not city property.

The face of homelessness has shifted.

“You’ve got lots of families you’ve got lots of working people. About a third of homeless are in the workforce, right,” Mayor Cognetti continued.

David Wilkerson is a prime example of that. Wilkerson has been without stable shelter for the last four months.

He’s recently secured a full-time job as a janitor, to save up for an apartment.

Wilkerson hopes sharing his story helps the community see people like him are just trying to get back on their feet.

For help, call 1 (877) 428-8844 toll-free from Monday to Friday from 9:00 a.m. to 8 p.m. or dial 7-1-1 for TTY.

  • Carbondale Housing Authority: (570) 282-0280

  • Housing Authority of the County of Lackawanna: (570) 342-7629

  • Scranton Housing Authority: (570) 348-4400

You can also call the phone numbers listed above for help in finding affordable housing.

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