Dear Gov. Newsom: Homelessness, like coronavirus, is a public health crisis. Solve both

Dear Gov. Newsom:

Your steady leadership during this coronavirus pandemic sets an example for others to follow. But your order for Californians to shelter-in-place underscores a tragic reality: Too many Californians today have neither shelter nor place. That’s because California was already struggling to contain the public health emergency of epidemic homelessness before COVID-19 hit.

Homeless people suffer due to our neglect. California’s lack of shelter and affordable housing has jeopardized the health and safety of tens of thousands of people – many of them frail, elderly or ill – for decades. In recent years, these vulnerable Californians have even contracted “medieval” diseases like typhus due to the unsanitary conditions of life on the street. These humans whom we regularly deny the use of sinks to wash their hands now face the deadly threat of the coronavirus.

If they succumb, we are responsible.

President Trump’s failure to respond urgently to COVID-19 has forced California to take drastic measures to slow the virus’ spread. This new emergency is compounded by the state’s pre-existing public health crisis of homelessness. As a result, you now have a moral mandate to solve for both issues. For the sake of public health and human dignity, we urge you to establish permanent protections for the homeless.

Governor, you took office during an unprecedented societal breakdown. You did not create the underlying inequalities driving homelessness. You dedicated more than $1 billion to start solving the problem. You identified state lands that could accommodate shelters. You rolled out 100 trailers for temporary housing and pushed local governments to act.

No governor has done more, but it wasn’t enough. Your promise of 3.5 million new housing units by 2025 proved empty. Some cities stepped up with piecemeal solutions, but thousands of humans continued to live in misery.

Homelessness is a catastrophic humanitarian failure. Yet necessary innovations like tent villages, smaller forms of shelter and increased density have not fit everyone’s lofty conception of housing. We have not wanted to see people sleeping in the cold, but some of us have opposed all actionable solutions.

Just look at Sacramento, where city councilmembers like Angelique Ashby and Larry Carr have decried homelessness while resisting plans to provide 100 new shelter beds in each district. Look at Sacramento County, which has evicted homeless people from empty lots while failing to provide alternatives. Our leaders don’t want people defecating on the streets but won’t provide toilets.

This absurd stalemate was the status quo. But the coronavirus has radically shifted our reality. Now, we must stay indoors and avoid social contact. Many people now work from home. Others have lost their jobs and face an uncertain future. A January poll found that 37.5 percent of Californians “were afraid that they or a family member could become homeless.” Suddenly, these citizens must confront their worst fear. The Great Recession – a purely man-made catastrophe – caused a surge in homelessness. How many more unsheltered Californians will the coronavirus pandemic’s economic destruction create?

Your decision, Gov. Newsom, to use emergency funds to provide immediate shelter for the homeless makes it clear you grasp the situation. Providing thousands of motel rooms and trailers is a good start. But why didn’t you take such urgent actions to protect people from the dire plague of poverty?

The answer: California wasn’t ready. Maybe we are now. This pandemic has exposed our interconnections. We understand more clearly how caring for ourselves means caring for others. This disruption is awakening our empathy and shifting the definition of possibility. We must emerge from this moment with an entirely new approach: housing for all, and a California where no person lacks shelter. Governor, please bypass the naysayers and impose housing innovations needed to contain the current threat – and then refuse to go back to the “homeless as usual” model.

Mayor Darrell Steinberg, who chairs your commission on homelessness, put it this way: “We know what we cannot do, and that is to bring tens of thousands of people indoors during the crisis only to turn them out once the crisis has abated.”

There’s a saying in politics: Never let a crisis go to waste. It may seem cynical in normal times, but emergencies require bold leadership. President Franklin D. Roosevelt exemplified it during the Great Depression and World War II. Gov. Jerry Brown demonstrated it during the budget crisis. Now, it’s your turn.

Governor, you didn’t create these problems, but you did promise “courage for a change.” The change is here. It’s time for courage.

This story was originally published March 23, 2020 at 4:00 AM with the headline "Dear Gov. Newsom: Homelessness, like coronavirus, is a public health crisis. Solve both."