What is homelessness czar’s first move?
Gov. Gavin Newsom has taken grief for failing to fulfill what seems like a pretty achievable campaign promise: appointing a homelessness “czar” to help the 150,000 Californians living in shelters and on the streets. Newsom’s quest, which at various points had the mayor of Sacramento, the state secretary of health and human services and a Washington DC-based consultant co-wearing the “czar” crown, culminated earlier this month in a Truman-esque “buck stops here” declaration.
“You want to know who’s the homeless czar?” Newsom said, index finger pounding the podium. “I’m the homeless czar in the state of California.”
Well, good czars are hard to
find. But that’s partly because homelessness is a complex and difficult problem, with options that range, at best, from imperfect to limited. Some choices might bring people in from the streets over the long term, but are expensive and time-consuming. Others might prevent people from becoming homeless in the first place, but are difficult to efficiently target.
Poll after poll suggests Californians want something done about homelessness, ASAP. So, we’re temporarily making you czar. Here’s a menu of talkedabout “solutions” rated with expert input according to speed, cost, and political feasibility. What would be your battle plan?
Option 1: Build way more permanent supportive housing
What is it?
Subsidized apartments that charge people experiencing homelessness minimal rents with no limits on how long they can stay. Built by nonprofit developers and paid for with public dollars, they “support” residents with in-house or visiting case managers who bring tenants to health appointments, show them how to use appliances and connect them with job and safety net programs. Permanent supportive housing primarily helps the chronically homeless, who often have severe disabilities such as serious mental illness, drug addiction and physical ailments.
Cost: (Expensive) Nonpartisan research consistently says permanent supportive housing is very effective at keeping the chronically homeless housed, which saves on health and law enforcement costs. But the upfront cost of building it is a lot, especially where it’s needed
most — $500,000 per unit in Los Angeles, for example. Newsom recently pledged $750 million in new emergency homelessness funding for the entire state. If you used all of that to build new permanent supportive housing in L.A., you’d get 1,500 units. Los Angeles County alone had nearly 16,000 chronically homeless people in 2019.
Speed: (Relatively slow) It takes one to three years in California to build this kind of housing. You can do some things to speed up the process, such as get rid of environmental reviews for new projects. But unless you’re buying a motel and converting it (more on this later), this is still going to take some time.
Political support: (Decently strong) Many homelessness advocates tout permanent supportive housing as the solution most worthy of more dollars, and the governor and big city mayors champion it frequently. Neighbors may not love the idea of new low-income housing on their block, but they hate it less than shelters. But ask Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti how the cost and time of building new supportive housing plays politically. Once a rising star among Democrats with national ambitions, Garcetti has seen his popularity falter as a $1.2 billion voter-approved bond has generated just one unit after three years.
Option 2: Embrace ‘Right to Shelter’
What is it?
A legal obligation for every city and county in California to provide shelter beds for every person experiencing homelessness, and a legal obligation for the homeless to accept shelter when offered. Advocates for “right to shelter” cite New York City’s success in using the policy to bring its homeless population indoors — New York has a much smaller rate of “unsheltered” homeless than
California. Detractors argue “right to shelter” simply warehouses people experiencing homelessness and that in a world of finite resources, permanent housing should take priority. Cost: (Expensive) No reliable estimate exists for what “right to shelter” would cost statewide. But it’s not cheap for New York City, which spends nearly $2 billion annually on its shelter system. California has a much larger homeless population than New York, and would need more upfront investment to get new shelters built. The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office estimated providing a bed in a shelter for every homeless person in the state would cost $2 to $3 billion annually — not including the upfront cost of new construction. Speed: (Relatively slow) Building a shelter takes less time than permanent housing — if you can get neighbors and local elected officials to sign off. That’s a big if. Even progressive places like San Francisco have seen attempts to build new shelters blocked or delayed by lawsuits from neighborhood groups who fear crime and declining property values if a shelter is placed nearby. State laws have made it tougher to file these lawsuits in recent years.
Political support: (Weak) Not a ton of support for this one. The governor fears its cost, homelessness advocates fear its potential civil liberties restrictions and cities and counties would demand more funding if obligated to build new shelters. Speaking of…
Option 3: Sue cities that don’t do enough
What is it?
Most of what California cities and counties do to address homelessness is voluntary; no state law punishes cities that fail to make progress towards reducing the number of people sleeping on the streets. Newsom’s
Council of Regional Homeless Advisors recommended changing that earlier this month, with a new “legally enforceable mandate” that would force municipalities and the state to take specific actions towards ending homelessness. A “designated public official” could sue a city or county for failing to hit benchmarks on emergency shelters and permanent housing, and a judge could then seize control of a local government’s homelessness initiatives. Cost: (Expensive)
Yes, we know all the options so far are expensive. Newsom’s task force conveniently omitted how much a “legally enforceable mandate” might cost the state. But it’s not going to be cheap. Cities and counties will demand additional resources to meet the state’s goals, whatever they are. Those funds also would likely have to be annual and ongoing — something the governor has been reluctant to approve. Speed: (Relatively slow) Newsom’s task force was also ambiguous on how quickly the state should force cities to reduce their homeless populations, recommending only an “aggressive but reasonable period of time.” Pressed, task force co-chair and Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg said he would expect the vast majority of his medium-sized city’s homeless population to be housed in five years. Not every local government may be as ambitious, and it will take time for the state to set up the legal apparatus to make this work.
Political support:
(Mixed)
The idea has broad support, ranging from big city mayors to progressive homelessness advocates to elected officials from some smaller local governments. But to become law, such a measure would need a twothirds vote of both chambers in the Legislature to be placed on the November ballot, and then a majority of the vote statewide. Democrats hold a supermajority in the Legislature, but the odds would be complicated if cost-conscious cities and counties push back.
Option 4: Go big on prevention
What is it?
Many California cities have made strides in moving people from streets and shelters into safe, stable housing. But progress is hard to show when, as in San Francisco, three people are losing a safe place to live for every homeless person who’s being housed. Enter the many state and local programs designed to prevent individuals from falling into homelessness: emergency rental assistance, for instance, or eviction defense or “shallow subsidies” to keep families in precarious housing situations from falling through the cracks.
Cost: (Less expensive… but less efficient)
A Chicago call center for people on the brink of homelessness distributed $3.7 million in prevention funds to nearly 3,000 households in 2018. A few hundred dollars cash was often enough to prevent tenants from losing their homes. But it’s difficult to target those programs because it’s hard to know which low income families might have managed to avoid homelessness even without the cash assistance. Only a fraction of low-income Californians fall into homelessness.
Speed: (Relatively fast) It’s easier to expand rental assistance programs quickly than to build new housing.
Political support:
(Strong)
Pretty much everyone is on board with doing more to prevent people from falling into homelessness. The real fight comes when finite financial resources are divided among prevention, shelter and permanent housing.