Although he promised as mayor of San Francisco in 2003 that he could end homelessness, California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) has spent twenty billion dollars over the last five years on the issue.
According to a report, Newsom laid out a 10-year plan to solve the issue by utilizing 550 housing units and tens of millions of dollars from the federal government. He said he did not want to make too many promises or fail to deliver enough. He was eager to get going.
Then-San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom called the city’s predicament an embarrassment and said he would be happy to be evaluated based on his response to the homeless problem four years later. With an overwhelming 73.66% of the vote, he secured his re-election in the city in 2011.
Solutions must be as daring as the issue is enormous, according to Newsom’s candidate for Governor in 2017, who vowed to add 4 million housing units by 2025.
Despite facing a recall effort in 2021, Governor Newsom secured re-election. Meanwhile, the number of people experiencing homelessness in California has increased dramatically.
Research out of California’s Public Policy Institute found that thirty percent of the nation’s homeless people call California home.
There has been a 2% rise in the number of homeless people without shelter in California since 2020 and a seventeen percent rise in the number of homeless people in shelters. There has been a 6% growth in the homeless population in California, whereas outside of California, the national average is just 0.4%.
Although the research did find an increase in homeless people in the downtown areas of most cities, San Francisco saw a very slight decline in this issue between 2020 and 2022.
Nonetheless, with more veterans without housing and more unaccompanied youths than any other city in the nation, San Francisco ranks sixth. Of California’s homeless population, 67% do not have access to shelters while Newsom has been in office.
With 44 out of every 10,000 Californians experiencing homelessness—the worst rate in the nation—the situation has deteriorated even throughout Newsom’s time in office.
The state’s over $10 billion three-year homelessness prevention spending is revealed in a new study. Over 40% of the 250k Californians who accessed such programs were housed. Which suggests the majority didn’t or California lost track of them.
