Gov. Newsom’s executive order on homelessness: Using tax dollars to harm communities | Opinion

In a rapid departure from precedent, California is no longer focusing on housing first policies. Instead, our state government is quickly enacting policies on state and local levels to further empower law enforcement to cite people sleeping outside.

Gov. Gavin Newsom recently issued an executive order mandating state agencies to develop policies for clearing encampments from state property, such as state parks. While local governments are not required to adopt similar properties, the governor made his position clear when he posted to X: “No more excuses. We’ve provided the time. We’ve provided the funds. Now it’s time for locals to do their jobs.”

Meanwhile, Sacramento continues to face a public health crisis, and new judicial decisions have only made the problem worse.

This past June, the U.S. Supreme Court sided with the city of Grants Pass, Oregon, upholding its ban on sleeping outside. Disappointingly, this decision deemed that penalizing people for sleeping in public areas did not violate the Constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment. This change in policy directly criminalized homelessness and indirectly criminalized poverty.

California might seem like a haven to the underserved, but local governments and large cities across the state are chomping at the bit to fall in line with Newsom’s policy changes. Policies about sweeping homeless encampments serve to simply remove people experiencing homelessness from view, without addressing the root causes of the problem: the need for housing, healthcare, among other services.

As local medical professionals and public policy advocates, we are greatly concerned by the stance our governor has taken and the ramifications these decisions will have on people experiencing homelessness. Police sweeps are associated with worse health outcomes, and can be medically and emotionally damaging on an individual level and systemic level. Regularly uprooting people from their established place of living can disconnect people from their community and to healthcare services, leading to increased emergency service utilization and an increased financial burden on taxpayers.

Until we can place people into permanent housing, sweeps only served to shuffle people experiencing homelessness around the city.

It is not too late to influence Sacramento’s policies regarding homelessness. Newsom’s executive order applies to state property, not local government. With Mayor Darrell Steinberg’s tenure ending later this year, the new mayor has a pivotal opportunity to assist our neighbors who are experiencing homelessness.

From the front lines of this issue, we recommend that local governments take a stance against Newsom’s directive. The Los Angeles Board of Supervisors recently unanimously passed a resolution opposing the governor’s order to dismantle encampments. Instead, they to continue efforts to increase permanent housing, shelter beds and outreach services.

The city of Berkeley has used property transfer funds from a local ballot initiative passed in 2018, together with funds from the federal and state government, to fund permanent supportive housing, shelter beds, case management and homelessness prevention services. Los Angeles and Berkeley have each since had significant drops in the number of unhoused persons, showing that these interventions work to place people into housing.

Sacramento can join these municipalities by providing compassionate and effective methods to address the issues of homelessness. We need to prioritize offering temporary and permanent housing to people experiencing homelessness. Our policies should focus on having a permanent housing plan for each person moving out of a shelter, requiring more effort put into developing trust and rapport with our unhoused peers through deeper engagement with this community.

Reject the misguided and counterproductive policies of the governor, and, instead, embrace policies that have been shown to address root causes of homelessness. The money spent on police sweeps to shuffle people around could be diverted toward social services and housing. On an individual level, these efforts could help our community members avoid less trauma associated with moving frequently; at a systems level, these efforts would improve the overall health of our community.

Until there is housing for people experiencing homelessness, police sweeps will continue to waste money and ultimately hurt our community.