Want to end homelessness in California? Take lessons from the vaccine rollout

It’s foolish to assume that the scale of the homelessness crisis in California is due to a lack of awareness or concern. Quite the opposite, it’s practically impossible to find a Californian who doesn’t lament the humanitarian crisis unfolding on our streets. In 2019, over 85% of Californians said they are “concerned about the presence of homeless people in their community.” Since the pandemic, likely more still. Yet, here we are.

In 2018, out of deep humanitarian concern, the people of the City of Berkeley elected to pay higher property taxes so long as the money went to addressing homelessness. I was appointed to the advisory board assigned oversight of these new funds. My colleagues and I were unanimous in our advice to city officials: We need to invest in housing that is permanently affordable through city-sponsored rental subsidies.

The city approved the funding allocation, but when COVID hit, all plans to provide permanent housing subsidies died. Why? City staff favored short-term programs that cost less. Every member of the board, myself included, left the panel soon after.

From this, I learned that if we want to see meaningful change when it comes to homelessness in California, we’ve got to learn and apply some lessons from the vaccine rollout. Cities across California need to adopt the Biden administration’s philosophy of our worst case scenario being that we did too little.

In Berkeley’s published pre-pandemic plan to end homelessness, the city lists permanent housing subsidies as their largest and most important funding priority. Yet, the city’s latest policies in practice tell another story. As with the vaccine rollout, we need to buckle down and spend.

Moreover, applying some lessons from the vaccine rollout doesn’t cost money. One take-away is that we need to think in the context of vulnerable populations. We should be asking: Which populations do we consider the most vulnerable? Among which populations is ending the crisis easiest? And which populations are the most difficult to service?

During my tenure, the Homeless Services Panel of Experts gave a population-specific approach a try. When we unanimously voted to recommend the funding of permanent housing subsidies, we made sure to specify that at least $500,000 be set aside for homeless families and children. The subpopulation, though relatively small, is incredibly vulnerable.

By the age of eight, one in three homeless children develop a major psychiatric disorder. According to the research, permanent housing subsidies are the most effective means to end their homelessness for good, thereby breaking the cycle of poverty in our community. Alas, per staff advice, this too was scrapped.

We need to take to heart the motto of the vaccine rollout: work small, think big.

The enormous task of ending homelessness cannot be achieved unless it’s broken down into workable chunks. We need to break the task of ending homelessness into population-based sequential-phases. Rather than trying to solve the problem of homelessness for everyone all at once, we start with the population we consider the most vulnerable, first. That victory accomplished, we move on to the next. Gov. Newsom has begun to outline what a population specific approach might look like by proposing spending priorities which aim to end family homelessness in the next five years.

If we approach our problems with a publicly accessible plan, we can restore faith in the local authorities who are managing the crisis on our streets. As with the vaccine rollout, stick to the plan, be honest about setbacks and remind people when they can expect to see gradual changes.