With the Newsom Administration and Democrats in charge of the California Legislature slashing funding for a key homeless shelter program by 75% over a two-year period, the Capitol is devoid of any substantive state-local partnership to turn the tide on this chronic crisis. But there is, at least, one idea.

The association that represents California’s counties is seeking political traction for a proposal for cities, counties and the state to formalize their prospective roles to combat homelessness. Why this wasn’t accomplished years ago speaks to the lack of leadership by Newsom and the Democrats on how to address this humanitarian crisis.

“There is nothing in state law that specifically articulates what’s supposed to happen around homelessness,” said Graham Knaus, the chief executive officer of the California State Association of Counties. “If this is one of the top priorities in the state of California, then….there should be a structure in state law to figure it out.”

Newsom’s temperament on the homelessness issue has increasingly been one of frustration and finger-pointing as his governorship winds down to a close. After directing more than $20 billion over the years to local governments to address homelessness, leading the passage of a $6.4 bond to expand mental health and creating a new court system to address those with mental illness, he increasingly acts as if the state’s job is done. He seems to think that cities and counties have all the tools they need to save the unhoused from a desperate future on the streets.

“So I say this with love and respect to the counties, no more excuses,” Newsom said during this month’s State of the State address. “It’s time to bring people off the streets and out of encampments and into housing and treatment.”

At least one leading Democrat in Sacramento knows that it’s disingenuous to begin taking victory laps to celebrate a legacy of success against homelessness, a problem that frequently starts with inadequate supplies of affordable housing.

“The lack of resources for housing in the governor’s budget is impossible to ignore, and it does not reflect our prior commitments or our values,” Assemblymember Jesse Gabriel, D-Encino, said at a recent committee meeting.

Knaus and the counties see the same homeless situation quite differently than Newsom, who believes the numbers of unhoused are diminishing.

“It’s going to get dramatically worse if we do not have a real structure in place,” Knaus said. He wants “a sensible system between the state, counties and cities, because that doesn’t exist.”

How a formal partnership would work

Knaus and the counties have in mind some “pilot projects” to test drive a partnership scheme among the three branches of government that could address homelessness in a far more coordinated manner.

CSAC proposes that the cities take the lead in establishing sufficient shelters for their local homeless populations. “Cities have land use authorities within their jurisdictions,” Knaus said. In places like Sacramento County, where the population in unincorporated communities is greater than any city, supervisors would have proportionate shelter responsibilities as well.

Counties already are responsible for providing mental health, drug treatment, indigent health care and other social services. They would do so in partnership with the cities and their shelter systems.

In recent years, the Legislature has vacillated wildly on its spending on local shelters via its Homeless Housing, Assistance and Prevention (HHAP) program, going from $1 billion in the budget a year ago to zero this year to maybe $500 million next year. Under this partnership model, the state would commit to $1 billion in annual funding for HHAP while expanding metrics for homeless changes at the local level.

None of this is rocket science. It’s astonishing that a legal framework to address homelessness among our levels of government does not already exist. Ending homelessness, or at least truly turning the tide on the crisis, would take extraordinary teamwork. But here in California, there is no such team. Our institutions of government now exist in their respective silos instead.

“That is the core point of what government is,” Knaus said. “Either we put something in place that does that, or we can all walk away, because we’re not going to create progress, and we’re going to fail.”

Hopefully the counties can find a lawmaker looking to take on the homeless crisis and its governance gap. Governors tend to dislike legislation telling them how to do their job. Newsom should set up his successor to have a chance at a success that eluded him, and that is by leading a state-local team with clear roles and responsibilities.

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