Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
Newsom Provides Welfare to the Wealthy, Skimps on Anti-Homelessness Programs
dan_walters
By Dan Walters, CalMatters Commentary
Published 3 months ago on
October 31, 2024

Newsom allocates $750M to Hollywood and $827M for homelessness, with differing attitudes towards recipients. (CalMatters/Manuel Orbegozo)

Share

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Gov. Gavin Newsom has played Santa Claus for the last week, promising bigger state subsidies to Hollywood’s film and video industry and giving cities and counties a new tranche of state aid to combat homelessness.

Dan Walters Profile Picture
Dan Walters

CalMatters

Opinion

The amounts are in the same ballpark but the recipients could not be more dissimilar, $750 million to improve the balance sheets of a few already wealthy entertainment producers and $827 million to help an estimated 186,000 homeless people gain shelter. The governor’s attitudes about recipients of the political largesse, as expressed in closely spaced news conferences in Los Angeles, are also markedly different.

Newsom characterized the expansion of entertainment subsidies from $330 million a year to $750 million as “investing in the future of this industry and the future of this state,” but devoted much of his homelessness announcement to warning local officials that they must do better and will face new performance standards.

“We’ve given our local partners the tools and the resources they need,” Newsom said in a statement. “It’s time to end this crisis now. These new funds represent the hard work, accountability and strategic planning needed to address homelessness with real, long-lasting results.”

The governor’s office said that, “as a condition of receiving the funding, the awardees must agree to increased accountability, transparency, and compliance measures. These new measures will help enhance the ability for these state investments to drive real, measurable results and will help improve the tracking of data and outcomes. This ensures that grant recipients remain accountable and protects state funding.”

Over the last four years, the state has allocated $2.4 billion in aid to local governments for homelessness programs, and Newsom has periodically threatened to withhold further appropriations, saying the recipients were not spending the money effectively.

However local officials have countered that getting money one year at a time, with no commitments of long-term financing, makes it difficult to establish permanent programs to help homeless people find shelter and deal with the issues that made them homeless in the first place.

State Auditor Criticizes Homelessness Council

It’s also noteworthy that Grant Parks, the state auditor, has excoriated Newsom’s Interagency Council on Homelessness for failing to monitor anti-homelessness programs as it was created to do. Until the council does its job, “the state will lack up‑to‑date information that it can use to make data‑driven policy decisions on how to effectively reduce homelessness,” Parks said in a report last April, just before Newsom and the Legislature staged their annual tussle over homelessness spending in the state budget.

Make Your Voice Heard

GV Wire encourages vigorous debate on local, state, and national issues. Submit your op-ed to bmcewen@gvwire.com for consideration.

As the number of homeless people continues to climb, the squabbling between Newsom and local officials seems less over how the crisis should be attacked and more over who will be blamed for failure.

Newsom has just 26 months remaining in his governorship, and it’s dead certain that when he leaves homelessness — particularly unsightly encampments on streets and sidewalks and in parks –— will still be high on the voting public’s list of issues. It might even be worse.

He is obviously eager for the political onus to be on local officials, rather than be part of his gubernatorial legacy, as signaled by his remark that “we’ve given our local partners the tools and resources they need.”

In fact, it’s far short of what would be needed for an all-out program to clear the streets by housing the unhoused.

The new allocation includes $254 million for the City of Los Angeles and Los Angeles County, but a recent study commissioned by Los Angeles City Council says that eradicating homelessness in the county would cost $22 billion over 10 years or $2.2 billion a year, nearly 10 times what the state is providing.

About the Author

Dan Walters has been a journalist for nearly 60 years, spending all but a few of those years working for California newspapers. He began his professional career in 1960, at age 16, at the Humboldt Times. CalMatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s state Capitol works and why it matters. For more columns by Dan Walters, go to calmatters.org/commentary.

RELATED TOPICS:

DON'T MISS

Trump Administration Directs All Federal Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Staff Be Put on Leave

DON'T MISS

Baseball’s Newest Hall of Famers: Suzuki, Sabathia, Wagner

DON'T MISS

‘Once in a Lifetime’ Snow Hits Parts of the US South

DON'T MISS

Trump Temporarily Halts Leasing and Permitting for Wind Energy Projects

DON'T MISS

Fresno Man Who Dealt Deadly Fentanyl Pill Gets 80-Month Prison Term

DON'T MISS

What’s Next for EVs as Trump Moves to Revoke Biden-Era Incentives?

DON'T MISS

US Throws out Policies Limiting Arrests of Migrants at Sensitive Locations like Schools, Churches

DON'T MISS

Visalia Police Find Man Shot Near Shopping Center. Tips Sought.

DON'T MISS

Convicted Jan. 6 Rioter Benjamin Martin Still Going to Prison

DON'T MISS

Is Lawsuit on Planned Reedley Job Center a ‘Shakedown’?

UP NEXT

Baseball’s Newest Hall of Famers: Suzuki, Sabathia, Wagner

UP NEXT

‘Once in a Lifetime’ Snow Hits Parts of the US South

UP NEXT

Trump Temporarily Halts Leasing and Permitting for Wind Energy Projects

UP NEXT

Fresno Man Who Dealt Deadly Fentanyl Pill Gets 80-Month Prison Term

UP NEXT

What’s Next for EVs as Trump Moves to Revoke Biden-Era Incentives?

UP NEXT

US Throws out Policies Limiting Arrests of Migrants at Sensitive Locations like Schools, Churches

UP NEXT

Visalia Police Find Man Shot Near Shopping Center. Tips Sought.

UP NEXT

Convicted Jan. 6 Rioter Benjamin Martin Still Going to Prison

UP NEXT

Is Lawsuit on Planned Reedley Job Center a ‘Shakedown’?

UP NEXT

Much of the Damage from the LA Fires Could Have Been Averted

Trump Temporarily Halts Leasing and Permitting for Wind Energy Projects

12 hours ago

Fresno Man Who Dealt Deadly Fentanyl Pill Gets 80-Month Prison Term

12 hours ago

What’s Next for EVs as Trump Moves to Revoke Biden-Era Incentives?

12 hours ago

US Throws out Policies Limiting Arrests of Migrants at Sensitive Locations like Schools, Churches

12 hours ago

Visalia Police Find Man Shot Near Shopping Center. Tips Sought.

12 hours ago

Convicted Jan. 6 Rioter Benjamin Martin Still Going to Prison

13 hours ago

Is Lawsuit on Planned Reedley Job Center a ‘Shakedown’?

13 hours ago

Much of the Damage from the LA Fires Could Have Been Averted

15 hours ago

CA Sued the Tar Out of Trump the First Time Around. How Did It Do?

15 hours ago

Israel’s Top General Resigns over Oct. 7 Failures, Adding to Pressure on Netanyahu

15 hours ago

Trump Administration Directs All Federal Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Staff Be Put on Leave

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s administration is directing that all federal diversity, equity and inclusion staff be put on pai...

8 hours ago

President Donald Trump signs an executive order as he attends an indoor Presidential Inauguration parade event at Capital One Arena, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025, in Washington. (AP/Evan Vucci)
8 hours ago

Trump Administration Directs All Federal Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Staff Be Put on Leave

Ichiro Suzuki in Yankee Pinstripes
11 hours ago

Baseball’s Newest Hall of Famers: Suzuki, Sabathia, Wagner

People walk past the 1900 Storm memorial sculpture on Seawall Blvd. during an icy winter storm on Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025 in Galveston, Texas. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP)
11 hours ago

‘Once in a Lifetime’ Snow Hits Parts of the US South

The five turbines of Block Island Wind Farm operate, Dec. 7, 2023, off the coast of Block Island, R.I., during a tour organized by Orsted. (AP File)
12 hours ago

Trump Temporarily Halts Leasing and Permitting for Wind Energy Projects

Photo of Mexican Oxy, fentanyl laced blue pills
12 hours ago

Fresno Man Who Dealt Deadly Fentanyl Pill Gets 80-Month Prison Term

President Donald Trump talks about the Endurance all-electric pickup truck, made in Lordstown, Ohio, at the White House, Sept. 28, 2020, in Washington. (AP File)
12 hours ago

What’s Next for EVs as Trump Moves to Revoke Biden-Era Incentives?

A Border Patrol truck rides along the border wall in Sunland Park, N.M., Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025. (AP/Andres Leighton)
12 hours ago

US Throws out Policies Limiting Arrests of Migrants at Sensitive Locations like Schools, Churches

Police are investigating after a man was found shot near a Visalia shopping center and transported to Kaweah Health.
12 hours ago

Visalia Police Find Man Shot Near Shopping Center. Tips Sought.

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend