Bill to prevent homelessness goes to Gov. Newsom's desk

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(The Center Square) – A bill designed to prevent homelessness in California is awaiting Gov. Gavin Newsom's signature after it passed the Legislature late last month.

Assembly Bill 1924, authored by Assemblymember Jesse Gabriel, D-Encino, and Assemblymember Sharon Quirk-Silva, D-Fullerton, requires the California Interagency Council on Homelessness to find strategies to curb the state's growing homelessness problem.

Under the legislation, the strategies have to be submitted in a report due on July 1, 2028.

The root cause of California’s homelessness, according to a legislative analysis of AB 1924, is the rising cost of housing. Families need to earn roughly $40 an hour to be able to afford a two-bedroom rental, the analysis said.

A housing shortage has made the problem worse, according to the analysis. It noted California needs 2.5 million additional housing units to help eradicate the homelessness problem, including 643,352 very-low income households and 394,910 for lower-income households.

Despite legislation passed over the last several years to allow residential housing on almost any site in the state, housing hasn't improved for many families across California, according to the bill analysis.

"For each homeless individual who is successfully connected with housing, nearly three access homelessness services for the first time,” Gabriel said in the bill analysis. “To make meaningful progress and address California's homelessness epidemic, we can't have more people entering homelessness than exiting it.”

Preventing homelessness in the first place is the most cost-effective way of solving the problem of homelessness, Gabriel wrote in the bill analysis.

“Through stronger guidance and support to those seeking to prevent Californians from becoming unhoused, this legislation will help prevent homelessness before it can occur, better protecting our state's most vulnerable residents and preserving limited state resources,” Gabriel added.

There were no groups or organizations that registered opposition to the bill, according to every version of the bill analysis on the state’s bill tracker website.

Gabriel and Quirk-Silva were not available for an interview on Friday. The Steinberg Institute, a mental health and substance use policy organization that supported the bill, also did not respond to The Center Square. Other organizations in California that address homelessness and Republicans who authored homelessness legislation this year also did not respond.