2023-102.2 Homelessness in California

This recommendation is underway. Due to timing factors, this report will be provided to City Council in October 2024.

The City of San José has taken the necessary steps to implement this recommendation as evidenced in the current budget process.

San Jose provided evidence showing that the city’s proposed 2024-25 budget included detail on the major components of the Housing Department and Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Services Department’s budgets related to homelessness. However, it has not yet addressed all aspects of the recommendation, including publicly reporting on homelessness-related spending by funding source and the amounts of unspent funds. The city indicated to our office that it is working to provide additional detail on the Public Works Department’s homelessness-related spending. It also indicated that it intends to create a budget Appendix showing the spending on homelessness services by department, program, and funding source. This appendix would include a summary of unspent funding. We look forward to reviewing any additional documents as part of our review of the city’s six month response.

This work is in process. The Housing Department Grants Management Team has implemented a pre/post-assessment process. Additionally, the Housing Department is reviewing neighboring jurisdictions’ practices and proactively contracted with an outside firm, The PUN Group, LLP, in February 2022 to train staff and complete contract monitoring. As of spring 2024, The PUN Group, LLP, is also conducting pre- and post-risk assessments, which will be an ongoing practice. (Pre-risk assessments are completed at the start of all agreements. Post-risk assessments at the end of the agreements.) The Housing Department will also begin implementing site visitation and monitoring to ensure service provider compliance and efficient and effective delivery of services in accordance with the performance metrics to be included in each service provider contract.

As noted in the City of San José’s Response Letter to the State homeless audit, the City of San José has already established trash and other services to support people with basic needs. While there may be general health benefits, the programs, though not designed as public health and safety interventions, have a clear impact on public health and safety. As noted previously, the added cost burden of developing performance measures and an evaluation model for such interventions (if possible) would take away from resources to provide these much-needed services.

As to safety, the City of San José provides public safety services to all people who reside within the city limits without regard to whether a person has a home or is experiencing unsheltered homelessness. While the City of San José is in the process of evaluating how to increase safety in a variety of settings, there is not currently a “public safety program” focused solely on people experiencing unsheltered homelessness, and therefore, there is no additional update for this recommendation.

The city claimed that it fully implemented the recommendation. However, the city appears to indicate in its response to the recommendation that it will not take steps to implement the recommendation. We stand by our recommendation and look forward to the city’s response at six months.

This work is in process. We will begin requesting a monthly data draw from the County of Santa Clara on August 1, 2024, and will use the Housing Department’s Racial Equity Impact Team will coordinate with the Homelessness Response and Policy Divisions on actions, policies, and programming deliverables to address any disparities uncovered in our data to improve outcomes for historically impacted communities.

This is in process. As a part of the mission and implementation of the City of San José’s Housing Element Plan, as adopted by the Mayor and City Council, and the City’s Implementation Plan of the Community Plan to End Homelessness, the Housing Department has developed and implemented production plans annually. Through its various policies and programs, the City of San José continues to support the development of various new permanent supportive housing and rehabilitation of housing for extremely low-, very low- and low-income individuals and families as further memorialized in the City’s upcoming Fiscal Year 2024-2025 Operating and Capital Budget. In addition, the City of San José will continue to examine opportunities to geographically invest in emergency interim housing solutions throughout San José, in alignment with its stated goals.

This is in process. The Housing Department tracks utilization through the Homeless Management Information System and comprehensive data gathering and analysis from the contracted service providers. In order to ensure that the data is complete and accurate, the City of San José started implementing comprehensive data analytics and exploring additional systems and tools needed to enhance data collection and analytics.

The city provided documentation that it has begun the process of monitoring utilization rates at its interim housing facilities.

This recommendation is in progress. The City agrees that plans for siting and building permanent housing should be created, and staff are working on an Affordable Home Development Master Plan. However, due to resource constraints, the timeline for the completion of this work is projected to be in 2025 instead of by September 2024. Please note that this work may not be completed until 2026 due to delays in state funding that had previously been anticipated through the REAP 2.0 grant program. When completed, the Master Plan will provide a comprehensive plan to utilize City-owned property to develop homes for people of all incomes in all communities that are best served by transit and amenities. The Master Plan will reduce development costs and expedite housing construction on public land.

Additionally, the Master Plan will identify potential shelter sites to address the urgent need for increased shelter capacity for people experiencing homelessness. This Master Plan will expand upon the work and analysis completed in the City’s existing Comprehensive Shelter Strategy, published in June of 2023, which provided an analysis of existing sheltering options and the type and quantity of shelter beds needed in our region.