Let's Stay Focused on Homelessness

Op ed by Haney Hong

While Washington is tangled up in knots in talk over impeachment, I can’t stop thinking about an issue that’s much closer to home.  In fact, it’s about those who don’t have a home. 

We as a community can’t take our eye off the ball when it comes to homelessness – no matter how interesting a battle over Constitutional checks-and-balances might be.  The Washington drama is far away – and frankly, nothing most of us can influence with any real substance. But homelessness is right in front of us, and as San Diegans, you and I can vote for someone to do something about it.

We almost had a moment when the national conversation focused on something local and important to us in California.  The White House Council of Economic Advisors released a report on homelessness two weeks ago. President Trump – in his normal arrogant fashion – even suggested that he could somehow address this local matter from his national perch.  But the possible scandal with Ukraine has hijacked the conversation away from this critical local issue.

Let’s bring the focus back to us and what we are facing in the Golden State.  And while we talk about homelessness, we should let Washington keep the emotion and all the drama so we can talk seriously on this matter.  

In that vein, we need to ask our local and state candidates for office what they’re planning to do in addressing homelessness.  Next time you get a chance to meet with any of them, here are some things you ought to mention.

Ask them what they know and if they read the White House report.  Whether they’re paying attention to this or not signals how important the issue is to them.  They don’t have to agree with the report, but our candidates for office should at least be spending time trying to understand what it says.

Ask if they saw the part of the report that points out something almost common sensical, but easy to forget.  The expensive cost of housing is a huge driver in homelessness numbers. The candidates worth your vote should know the research cited in the report by Harvard economists, who some might consider liberal.  These researchers suggest the high cost of housing is significantly due to regulatory restrictions. Land use zoning, labor laws, and our self-imposed regulatory schemes drive up the costs of housing – and then increase the number of homeless.  

Now we shouldn’t entirely blame the politicians for this regulatory system that ironically fails to achieve the public goods we want.  It’s you and me – our fellow citizens – and what we demand from our leaders that have created the size of this regulatory beast that subsequently exacerbates this homelessness problem.

But even if we don’t blame politicians entirely, we should ask our candidates to do something about this regulatory mess!  We know it’s going to be hard, but the good public leaders have to be ready to make the tough calls dispassionately and with analysis backing them up.

Now in the meantime, if we are going to be voting for candidates who will do hard work addressing homelessness, we should be ready to pay for the heavy lift of reducing homelessness.  

Also, ask them how much addressing homelessness is costing us.  In San Diego County alone, the total taxpayer expenditure on homelessness is pushing a billion dollars annually.  To put that in a different frame, because big numbers are off-putting, you, I, and every other San Diegan taxpayer are paying, on average, about $300-ish each annually.

In the grand scheme of things, maybe that’s not too bad.  I suppose if we each put $5 every week in the offering plate at church, it would almost be about that amount.   And though the last official count of homeless in the area was just short of 10,000 people – still a big problem – we are thankfully better off here in San Diego than Los Angeles and San Francisco.  We have fewer homeless, and at least our numbers aren’t going up.  

But if we each are paying hundreds of dollars, ask the candidates: will you demand efficiencies?  Help us understand the difference our taxpayer dollars are making. Maybe then we might be okay chipping in more -- so long as you can prove that we are leveraging every dollar to the maximum extent.

In the meantime though, don’t give us drama or emotion.  Let Washington have that. Instead, make a commitment to action on homelessness supported with numbers and analysis.  That’s what will make good candidates worthy of our votes.