JOINT COALITION ON HOUSING AND HOMELESSNESS SOLUTIONS ISSUES LETTER TO CALIFORNIA'S GOVERNOR AND LEGISLATIVE LEADERS RE: 2024 BALLOT MEASURES

SACRAMENTO, Calif., Aug. 8, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- A coalition of over 70 of California's leading affordable housing, homelessness, and housing justice organizations is urging the state's Governor, Speaker of the Assembly and President pro tempore of the Senate to work together to bring three proposals on California voters during the 2024 election, including a bond to fund critical affordable housing needs, Governor Newsom's proposed Mental Health Services Act (MHSA) reform, and an initiative to lower the voter threshold required for local housing bonds. If passed, these initiatives would make significant progress to solving California's housing affordability and homelessness crisis.

Housing California Executive Director, Chione Lucina Muñoz Flegal, explains, "Our statewide coalition is asking Governor Newsom, Assembly Speaker Rivas, and Senate President Atkins to work together to bring California voters a package of housing bonds, MHSA reforms, and a new voter threshold for local housing bonds. We have a unique opportunity to make real change and need to use all the tools we have to solve homelessness and ensure that every Californian has a safe stable home that they can afford."

"Not since 2017 has the Legislature had an opportunity like this to pass a package of life-changing measures that would dramatically boost resources to address homelessness and the shortage of affordable homes in California," states President & CEO of the California Housing Partnership, Matt Schwartz. "The complementary nature of giving voters the ability to raise funds locally to match new state funding paired with much needed reforms to the Mental Health Services Act makes it critical that state leaders move them forward together as a package," he adds.

"This is the moment to act. The unmet need for affordable homes in California is at an all-time high, and voters have said that housing and homelessness are their top concerns. We must respond to those challenges in 2024," articulates Heather Hood, Vice President and Market Leader of Enterprise Community Partners Northern California. "We need to produce new affordable housing, keep rents from rising, and provide real intervention for people living on our streets. The ballot box is our opportunity to provide resources at scale to make all of this possible," she adds.

Executive Director of All Home, Tomiquia Moss, emphasizes, "To address the biggest challenges facing our communities—housing insecurity and homelessness—we have to reject the scarcity mindset that too often justifies half-measures or inaction. The 2024 ballot and legislative session are our best opportunity to do just that and deliver the tangible and sustainable progress on housing affordability that Californians are clamoring for."

Director of California State Policy at Coalition for Supportive Housing, Sharon Rapport, points out, "The bond would include funding for supportive housing for people who are experiencing homelessness to help struggling Californians exit homelessness, while reforms to our behavioral health response would ramp up housing interventions like rental assistance. Together, these provisions could create stability for thousands of struggling Californians."

"Communities across California demand solutions to housing and homelessness," urges Matthew O. Franklin, President and CEO of MidPen Housing. "Through the 2024 ballot, we have a rare opportunity to unlock the construction of thousands of shovel-ready affordable homes," he adds.

"By prioritizing housing bonds on the 2024 ballot, policymakers have an opportunity to course-correct decades of underfunding and ensure that the low-income communities and communities of color most impacted by today's housing crisis are prioritized and protected from housing insecurity," posits Cynthia Castillo, Policy Advocate for the Western Center on Law and Poverty posits, "Now is the time to lead with urgency and accountability to push us closer to realizing the promise of housing equity for all Californians," she adds.

Dr. Robert Wiener, the Executive Director of the California Coalition for Rural Housing underscores, "The housing crisis isn't exclusive to California's densely populated urban places.  It is being felt in agricultural areas, tribal communities, and every rural corner of the state where rates of poverty, overcrowding, and substandard housing are often greater than in the state's cities and suburbs. The needs of rural Californians are not always discussed, and as a result, the communities they call home have experienced neglect and underinvestment. This package of proposals would ensure the provision of crucial resources to underserved people and economically important but overlooked rural places."

Tommy Newman, Vice President of United Way of Greater L.A. concludes, "40% of unhoused Californians reside in Los Angeles County. L.A. County also has the highest rate of overcrowded homes in the state. The California Statewide Study of People Experiencing Homelessness, conducted by the University of California, San Francisco Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative, just validated what everyone knows to be true: a lack of affordable housing is forcing folks to become unhoused. Voters across the Golden State are ready to cast their ballots for solutions at scale."

Read the coalition's letter to California's governor and presiding officers of the legislature here.

Contact: Unai Montes, [email protected], 310.962.7369 (Bilingual)

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SOURCE Housing California