Some California Democrats are turning against their Golden State leader after Gov. Gavin Newsom's homeless council failed to track whether billions of dollars spent to curb the homeless crisis were successful in recent years. five years.
“When you come to a budget committee, there are no numbers,” Democratic Assemblyman Phil Ting told Newsom's housing and homelessness officials during Monday's budget committee hearing. “How many people have we helped? How many people are on the street?”
“Because that's what people want to know,” he added.
An executive with the California Interagency Council on Homelessness (CICH) responded that they are dealing with “data quality issues,” so there are still no metrics available on how more than $20 billion has been spent since the council's inception. .
“We are working quickly,” said CEO Meghan Marshall.
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California Gov. Gavin Newsom is facing backlash over $20 billion worth of untracked state homeless resources and programs. (MediaNews Group/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images | Contributor/Mario Tama/Staff)
“But what does that mean? We spend billions of dollars and we can't tell ourselves at all how many people we've helped,” Tang said.
Megan Kirkeby, deputy director of the California Department of Housing and Community Development, told lawmakers on the committee that the state had not previously required them to track their spending progress or the viability of their programs, adding that it is not “something to be proud of.” of.”
CICH, the blue state center for coordinating the state's homeless programs, put the blame on local cities last month in an emailed response to Fox News Digital's investigation into the failure to track money. A senior spokesperson said municipalities “are primarily responsible for implementing these programs and collecting data on the results that the state can use to evaluate the program's effectiveness.”
As the state faces a significant budget shortfall that must be resolved before the July deadline, both Republicans and Democrats in the legislature fear the audit findings could interfere with multiple requests from the city for more funds to address the crisis. of homeless people. California is ground zero for the highest number of homeless people in the country, with more than 181,000 people living on the streets.
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A homeless man walks through the Skid Row neighborhood of downtown Los Angeles on December 12, 2022. (Sarah Reingewirtz/MediaNews Group/Los Angeles Daily News via Getty Images)
In an explosive report last month, the state auditor found that nine state agencies have collectively spent $24 billion in state funds over the past five years administering at least 30 programs dedicated to addressing the homeless crisis, and The auditor said Newsom's homeless council “is responsible for coordinating, developing and evaluating the efforts of these nine agencies.”
The state's independent audit noted that CICH is required by law to report its finances related to all state-funded homeless programs, but that it stopped doing so in 2021.
Over the past five years, CICH did not consistently track whether the money actually improved the situation, the audit concluded. It also failed to collect and evaluate data on the outcomes of these programs due to the lack of a consistent method.
In a letter to the governor, the state auditor wrote that “the state must do more to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of its homeless programs.”
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Proposition 1 adds $6 billion to California's homeless funding. (FoxNews)
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Despite billions spent on housing and homelessness programs during fiscal years 2018-2023, the problem did not improve in many cities, according to the state auditor's report. Since 2013, the number of homeless people has increased by more than 53%.
As a result, Newsom called on cities to take more rigorous steps to enforce the state's progressive housing laws. At a news conference, Newsom announced that the state would expand a Department of Housing and Community Development agency to enforce laws requiring cities to meet a threshold of new housing, leading to legal action against rebellious cities like Huntington Beach. who have refused to increase the building.
“I'm no longer interested in failure,” the governor said.
Neither Newsom's office nor the CICH responded to Fox News Digital's request for comment by press time.
