Newly released federal data reveals that though California has spent over $17 billion to combat homelessness in the last several years, its homeless population has actually increased.
The numbers show that California’s homeless population now accounts for half the homeless population of the entire United States, and that the state is adding more homeless every year than any other state in the country.
CNN spoke to officials on Gov. Gavin Newsom’s, D-Calif., staff and other experts, some of whom insisted the problem would be “so much worse” if it weren’t for the billions the state government has thrown at the problem.
Others told the outlet that rent is just too high in the state for many to afford permanent housing.
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The CNN report on this federal data opened with the fact that “California has spent a stunning $17.5 billion trying to combat homelessness over just four years. But, in the same time frame, from 2018 to 2022, the state’s homeless population actually grew.”
Still, Newsom’s senior adviser on homelessness, Jason Elliott, told the outlet, “The problem would be so much worse, absent these interventions. And that’s not what people want to hear. I get it, we get it.”
CNN responded to Elliott’s answer, noting in the piece that “with $17.5 billion, the state could, theoretically, have just paid the rent for every unhoused person in California for those four years, even at the state’s high home costs.”
Elliot dismissed the outlet’s point, noting that money doesn’t cover both their housing and mental health treatment. He claimed, “That is reductive … Perhaps that would work for me, because I don’t have significant behavioral health challenges. If two thirds of people on the streets right now are experiencing mental health symptoms, we can’t just pay their rent.”
CNN followed up by noting that if 17.5 billion was allocated to house each homeless…
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