The mayor’s large shelter proposal, already controversial, ran into even stronger headwinds last week.
At about the same time, the county lost $10 million in state funding because supervisors backed off a plan to house homeless people in tiny cabins in Spring Valley.
In a move ripe with symbolism, the governor redirected most of that money to San Jose, which, along with Los Angeles and Sacramento, reported a decrease in its homeless population.
San Diego experienced a small increase in homelessness, though and some officials spoke optimistically that a turning point may be at hand after a huge jump last year.
Meanwhile, the California Coastal Commission approved city plans to open a parking area in Point Loma where people can sleep in their cars — as opponents continued to threaten legal action to stop it.
All the while, for the 27th straight month, the San Diego region reported more people becoming homeless than the number of people moving into housing.
Turning the tide on growing homelessness has never been easy, but San Diego’s efforts to do so have hit a tough stretch lately.
On Monday, the San Diego City Council is expected to discuss a proposed 30-year lease for Mayor Todd Gloria’s proposed 1,000-bed shelter at Kettner Boulevard and Vine Street just east of San Diego International Airport.
Real estate experts, and most recently the city’s Independent Budget Analyst, have emphasized the prosed lease is above market value. This comes at a time when there may be other commercial real estate opportunities, particularly downtown where the office vacancy rate is about 30 percent.
That’s not to say many, or any, of potentially available buildings would be suitable for a homeless facility, even if their prices are more competitive than the Middletown project. Gloria has pointed that out and noted the city has surveyed and used other properties to shelter homeless people.
Locating a shelter is difficult primarily because they almost always run into stiff neighborhood opposition.
Some have been temporary and the city will lose hundreds of shelter beds in the coming months with no replacements as yet. Gloria has said the large shelter would end this “shell game” of moving facilities around.
The mayor’s proposal was not a result of a competitive process as the budget analyst’s report pointed out, but the result of the warehouse owner approaching the city.
There has not been a value assessment of what else could be accomplish that money. The total cost of the project over the length of the revised lease has not surfaced. The original lease proposal potentially exceeded $1 billion.
The budget analyst report suggested a competitive process could benefit the city.
Gloria and ers of the warehouse project have said providing a variety of necessary services to people at the shelter will be cheaper than smaller facilities because of economy of scale. Some critics have disputed that.
Hovering over the debate is the city’s sorry history of real estate deals, particularly with no-bid arrangements like the lease and eventual purchase of the uninhabitable 101 Ash St. office building.
Meanwhile, with much up in the air, the San Diego Housing Commission staff is looking at what other commercial sites could be available for shelters, likely smaller ones.
The county’s plan to put 150 sleeping cabins in Spring Valley ran into opposition from residents. After the Board of Supervisors recently reversed its approval, the state last week nixed the $10 million for the project.
The county is now looking to place half that many cabins in Lemon Grove, with hopes that eventually will bring back the state money. However, Politico reported that the funds are going to San Jose.
There’s no dispute the county violated its agreement with the state to use the money on the Spring Valley site. But there’s a bit of irony because the state had been dragging its heels in providing tiny cabins.
In March 2023, Gov. Gavin Newsom promised to send 1,200 of the tiny homes to four regions: San Diego, Los Angeles, San Jose and Sacramento. In May of this year, none had materialized, according to CalMatters.
Some of that may have been due to local jurisdictions not being ready. San Diego County approved the Spring Valley plan just this March. San Jose approved its plans in October. The state also may have complicated matters by deciding to send grants, instead of shipping the actual cabins as originally intended.
The state has been under fire for spending billions of dollars on combatting homelessness, yet the unhoused population continued to grow. Newsom has said he will get tougher on local governments that don’t make progress on homelessness, and his istration already has demonstrated its willingness to take legal action against cities that don’t meet state housing goals.
San Diego is not one of them. The city has named one of the state’s “pro-housing” jurisdictions by Newsom. Yet the dearth of affordable housing remains critical in San Diego — as elsewhere in the state — and the region has one of the most competitive rental markets in California.
San Diego had a surge in home construction last year, but in the first half of this year the region had the fastest rising home prices in the U.S.
As any expert on homelessness will tell you, providing affordable housing is key to reducing homelessness.
What they said
Rep. Sara Jacobs in the Voice of San Diego.
“In my read of history, young people tend to be right. We should be listening.”
