The Homeless Crisis: Billions Spent, Little Progress

(Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

By Andrew Mendez

California's homelessness crisis has reached a breaking point, with LA County residents footing an ever-increasing bill while the homeless population increases. Since 2017, hundreds of millions in sales tax dollars were generated though Measure H, and with the passage of Measure A, that amount will double to an estimated billion dollars annually. Yet the billion-dollar question remains: Where is all this money going?

Recent court-ordered audits reveal financial mismanagement and a striking lack of accountability. The situation has become so problematic that, on Tuesday, the LA County Board of Supervisors voted 4-0 to withhold $300 million in taxpayer funding from the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA)—an unmistakable rebuke and a silent admission of the agency’s bureaucratic failures.

Meanwhile, the state's approach to transitional housing has proven both dangerous and ineffective. An investigation by CalMatters found that shelters—California's go-to solution for homelessness—are deadlier than jails. Despite spending roughly $1 billion on shelters since 2018 and more than doubling the number of beds from 27,000 to 61,000, the human cost has been staggering: 2,007 individuals have died in these facilities between 2018 and 2024.

The conditions are appalling—black mold, bedbugs, domestic violence, and sex crimes were found in these facilities. Most alarming is their ineffectiveness: only 22% of people who cycle through shelters find permanent housing, and when counting all homeless individuals, that figure drops to 10%.

Yet cities trying to address these concerns strategically are being punished. Anaheim was sued for denying a permit for an interim housing project in a neighborhood already hosting twelve group homes. Norwalk, home to three homelessness-related projects, faces litigation for invoking a moratorium on transitional housing citing the impact that compromised their public safety and city resources during the state-imposed 15-month Project Roomkey project. These cities aren't refusing to help—they're asking for collaboration with the State of California to address the costly challenges cities are facing that come with these transitional housing projects and the unforeseen impacts. Simply put, they wanted better solutions with measurable outcomes.

The state's approach ignores a fundamental reality: shelters have essentially become low-budget facilities with limited mental health resources operated by underpaid staff. According to LA Times reporting, nearly two-thirds of homeless individuals report having regularly used illegal drugs at some point in their lives — highlighting the importance of drug treatment services yet one in five individuals actively seeking addiction treatment can't access it. These complex situations require comprehensive approaches that temporary shelters fail to provide.

The distribution of Measure H and A funds is another issue. Measure A is expected to generate billions of dollars by local sales taxes and yet, a majority of cities are only being allocated 15% of those funds which dependent upon calculation formulas may amount to a few hundred thousand. The City of Azusa spent 1.9 million on transitional housing last year alone. The Measure A formula takes into account a city’s homeless population in a previous point-in-time count (PIT), but ignores the millions already invested by those cities towards successful outcomes. Many of these cities are already spending millions of their own funds on social services and outreach programs that have well documented results. And yet, local agencies that bear the brunt of the crisis will receive the least amount of resources from the billions collected.

The lesson from Measure H is clear: homelessness solutions must be implemented at the local level. This means empowering local jurisdictions with more direct funding to address and plan solutions regionally. Only with local control and meaningful collaboration can we hope to address this crisis effectively. The state's current approach of finger-pointing while leaving municipalities to "figure it out" without funding is not working. It's time to acknowledge that the billions spent have not yielded results, and that a fundamental restructuring of our approach—one that prioritizes local solutions and accountability is long overdue.

The people of California deserve better than dangerous shelters, mismanaged funds, and ineffective policies. They deserve real solutions that address the root causes of homelessness and provide genuine pathways to recovery and stability.

Andrew Mendez is a city councilmember in Azusa, Calif.