Homelessness chief steps down; takes job across bay
Oakland is losing its top official tasked with managing homelessness, at a time when the city is struggling with an ongoing crisis of unhoused residents living in cars, RVs and sprawling encampments.
Daryel Dunston, who was hired as Oakland’s first homelessness administrator in February 2020, has accepted a new position at the San Francisco Foundation. His last day with the city of Oakland will be Monday, according to city spokeswoman Karen Boyd.
Dunston was in the midst of rolling out several new strategies to address homelessness, including the city’s controversial new encampment management policy. The city will look for a replacement for Dunston, Boyd said. But for now, LaTonda Simmons, assistant city administrator, will take over oversight of homelessness programs.
“All of that work will continue,” Boyd said.
Dunston did not respond to a request for comment.
Dunston had spearheaded efforts to implement the city’s encampment management policy, which marks certain areas — including those near schools, homes, businesses and public parks — mostly off-limits to camping. But enforcement of the new policy, which the City Council passed in October, has been slow. The policy is set to be re-evaluated in April, and activists fighting for the rights of unhoused people to camp on public land, likely will push for it to be scaled back or abolished.
Dunston also was in the midst of getting the city’s new Commission on Homelessness off the ground. The group, made up of volunteers who have personal or professional experience with homelessness, includes Candice Elder of the East Oakland Collective, Tomiquia Moss of All Home and Trent Rhorer, executive director of San Francisco’s Human Services Agency. The commission had its first meeting in December, but has been bogged down by mandatory trainings and other procedural tasks. One of its first orders of business is to review the city’s Encampment Management Policy next month.
In an email to city officials and department directors, City Administrator Ed Reiskin listed Dunston’s accomplishments, including implementing the city’s first RV safe parking program and setting up a city trailer park for homeless residents.
“I have immense respect for Daryel and want to thank him for his leadership and significant contributions to Oakland,” Reiskin wrote. “We wish Daryel all the best in his new endeavors.”
Oakland’s homelessness crisis has created significant tension within the city, and programs and policies proposed by Dunston and others often have been met with intense criticism — both from activists worried they will displace vulnerable unhoused residents, and from housed neighbors upset they don’t do enough to clean up encampments. Oakland reported its unhoused population grew by nearly 50% between 2017 and 2019.
In December 2019, Assistant
City Administrator Joe DeVries, who had taken the lead on city homelessness programs, was shouted down during a City Council meeting as he attempted to present a report on how the city manages homeless encampments.
He had proposed issuing citations as a way to prevent people from camping in previously cleared areas. Activist Needa Bee called him a murderer. When DeVries attempted to leave, he was accosted by activists.
DeVries stepped back from his work on homelessness, and now is the city’s director of interdepartmental operations.
Dunston, who had replaced
DeVries, is moving on to lead the San Francisco Foundation’s Place Pathway program, which provides grants to people working on affordable housing.
“The state of housing and homelessness in the Bay Area requires an emergency response from all sectors, including philanthropy,” Fred Blackwell, CEO of the San Francisco Foundation, wrote in an emailed statement. “Daryel is a former firefighter, EMT and housing expert. We couldn’t be more excited to bring his emergency lens to the critical need for safe and affordable housing for all in our region.”