The regulations require the Department to place your family in shelter within 20 miles of your family's home community, unless there is no space available or you request placement farther away. If there is no available shelter within those 20 miles, you can be placed beyond the 20 miles or in a DHCD-approved hotel or motel until a shelter becomes available. If you have been placed farther than 20 miles from your home community, or if you have been put in a hotel or motel, you should be transferred when space in a closer shelter opens up.14
If you are a teen parent or pregnant teen under the age of 20 and receiving TAFDC, DHCD will place you in Teen Living Program instead of a family shleter, unless there is no Teen Living Program available.
DHCD must make every effort to ensure that children in shelter can continue going to school in their home communities. 15
If you want to be placed so that your children can continue school in their home community, make a written request to your local DHCD office and call the housing unit at the central DHCD office at 617- 573-1347.
In addition, DHCD must take into account disability-related reasons that you need to be in a shelter near your home community or in a particular type of shelter. For example, if someone in your household needs a wheelchair-accessible shelter or if someone has a mental health disability and needs privacy, DHCD must take this into account when placing you in a shelter.
In practice, DHCD has no reliable system for making sure that families get moved back to their home communities, so it's a good idea to follow up regularly with DHCD if you want to get moved back.
Produced by Ruth Bourquin and Faye B. Rachlin Last updated March 2010