Chicago Must Increase AIDS Funding, Advocates Say

AIDS advocates were dismayed to learn last week that Mayor Richard M. Daley’s proposed city budget for 2007 seeks no new funding for HIV/AIDS prevention services for a fourth year in a row.

“HIV prevention services must become a citywide priority if we are ever to turn the tide against this deadly disease,” said Mark Ishaug, AIDS Foundation of Chicago (AFC) executive director. “HIV is spreading most rapidly within communities of color and no ward in our city is immune. Quite simply, Chicago can and must do more.”

The last budget increase for HIV prevention occurred in 2003 when city leaders approved a $600,000 boost in funding, primarily from the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG). There has not been a single adjustment since then to account for inflation, new trends and complexities in the epidemic, or the escalation of HIV/AIDS cases, particularly in communities of color.

Meanwhile, federal and state HIV prevention funding granted to the city has been cut by almost half a million dollars. New federal mandates to expand voluntary HIV counseling and testing services and onerous record-keeping activities mean less funding for prevention education, condom distribution, school-based and faith-based education, and targeted interventions helping those at highest risk avoid infection. Congress is also likely to approve less funding for CDBG next year, potentially reversing budget gains made in 2003.

“There’s an overwhelming body of evidence that HIV prevention works. By averting new infections, HIV prevention saves lives, lowers healthcare costs, and increases productivity,” said Ishaug. “But the beneficial effects of prevention cannot be realized without adequate funding.”

More than 28,000 Chicagoans are believed to be HIV-positive, including an estimated 7,000 who remain unaware they are living with HIV. Since 1981, more than 12,000 residents have died from HIV/AIDS. While the epidemic has touched every community area and population in the city, communities of color remain disproportionately affected, comprising 76% of recently diagnosed HIV cases.

AFC urges Mayor Daley and City Council to consider desperately needed funding increases for HIV prevention as they finalize the 2007 budget over the next six weeks. AIDS advocates should also contact their aldermen and Mayor Daley to advocate for HIV prevention funding increases. AFC encourages AIDS advocates to attend the pubic hearing on the budget being held in the City Council chamber at 10:00 a.m. on Wednesday, November 1.

“Preventing new infections and the suffering they cause is nothing short of a moral imperative,” said Rev. Doris Green, AFC Director of Community Affairs. “We know how to prevent new cases of HIV; the question remains, do we as a city and society have the will to make prevention a fiscal priority?”

Advocates Urge Support for AIDS Housing

AFC will deliver this week more than 3,200 individually signed petitions to Mayor Daley and Governor Rod Blagojevich from residents concerned about the short supply of safe and affordable housing for people living with HIV/AIDS.

Housing advocates applauded a focus on affordable housing in Mayor Daley’s proposed 2007 budget, which dedicates $2.4 million in Skyway funding to the Plan to End Homelessness. The City’s Low-Income Housing Trust Fund will begin to distribute 2,000 rental subsidies this winter, thanks to a real estate surcharge collected as part of the Illinois Rental Housing Support Program signed into law in 2005 by Gov. Blagojevich.

Petitioners ask Daley and Blagojevich to prioritize new rental subsidies for low-income disabled individuals, including people with HIV/AIDS. As the first jurisdiction in Illinois to implement the new program, Chicago has a unique opportunity to demonstrate how this limited supply of assistance can be prioritized for vulnerable disabled individuals living on low and fixed incomes. AFC’s hope is that every jurisdiction across the state will prioritize subsidies for low-income disabled individuals facing difficulties obtaining or retaining safe, affordable housing.

Despite a limited but essential supply of AIDS housing programs across the city, the need for assistance continues to outpace available resources. In metropolitan Chicago, more than 5,000 individuals with HIV/AIDS are homeless or at imminent risk of homelessness each year.

As the petition states, the lack of safe and affordable housing has dire consequences for people with HIV/AIDS whose survival can depend quite literally on having a stable place to live. Housing instability can affect adherence to complex medication regimens and can result in a dramatic and sudden deterioration in health, necessitating an over-reliance on emergency room and inpatient care.

Fact sheet on the need for increased HIV/AIDS prevention funding (PDF)

List of aldermen (PDF)

Chicago AIDS statistics (PDF)

Housing petition (PDF)

City Funding Action Alert

Archived News

2003 City Funding Campaign