Big Plans For Homelessness
In Which: Old City Hall gets a small fix due to homelessness, Student Homelessness gets some direct attention, and Homelessness only happens because of greed.
It’s holiday time, friends. City Council is off until mid-January and so is everyone else. Take a snooze from the news for a few weeks and enjoy time with those you care about—even if that’s just your cat. The Hayward Herald will take a break and return on January 7th. Until then, enjoy yourself however feels best.
Old City Hall Gets Some Attention
One of the Consent Items that Council was set to approve without comment was given extra protection by some members of the public. 3-time City Council Candidate Tom Ferreira gave comment calling for the continued preservation of the old City Hall building on Mission Blvd. “This is a centerpiece,” he said. “I really appreciate having this building for future generations to come.”
The item in question was a $128,000 expenditure to conduct minimal repairs to the old City Hall building in order to “ensure the building's security and address immediate infrastructure needs,” according to the Staff Report. The building has been vacant since the 1990s when it was determined that, due to damage from its placement on the Hayward Fault, it was unsafe to use. While the initial plan was to demolish it, community members came together to advocate for granting it historic status.
The City granted that status in 1996, but it was only a local designation—it hasn’t been registered on either State or National registries. The local designation only calls for preservation of the exterior—though the community group highlighted the beauty of the Council Chambers at the time. These repairs are only meant to secure first floor windows, repair doorways, and fix the roof until it is ultimately demolished.
These repairs were prompted by multiple fires caused by unhoused residents seeking shelter inside the long-vacant building. A different community member from the Hayward Concerned Citizens called for immediate demolition and expressed dismay at the use of public funds for a structure that would ultimately be demolished anyway. The City is currently prohibited from demolishing the building due to its local Historic designation.
It is unclear when, if ever, that designation would be revoked or amended.
Councilmember Roche also chimed in to request that the City install “slightly decorative doors” on the structure, to replace the plywood that has been screwed into place over the doors. Acting City Manager Dustin Clausen said they would try to make it “somewhat photogenic.” He said, “It pains me to see it as the eyesore it has become.”
More Planning Around Homelessness
The City of Hayward has a plan for addressing homelessness called the Let’s House Hayward Strategic Plan (the Plan). It was adopted in 2020, along with the American Rescue Plan Act funding that has paid for many of its initiatives. The City Council was tasked with giving direction on whether to continue with the plan, align with a County plan, or make amendments to the plan. The current plan is set to sunset in 2026.
The Community Services Manager, Dr. Amy Cole-Bloom stressed that the Plan is mostly a prioritization tool as the majority of its 43 strategies are unfunded—meaning there’s no money to actually make any of them a reality. Dr. Cole-Bloom gave information about Hayward’s unhoused population from the Point In Time Count.
Notably, the majority of the increase in unhoused people was from those who were sheltered and that Black people are disproportionately unhoused compared to the Hayward population. “Systemic racism is part of what drives people into homelessness,” Dr. Cole-Bloom said.
Public Comment Supports Plan, Focuses On Students
Several members of the public gave comment in support of the Plan. Vasko Yorgov, representing a group called House Hayward Now, pushed the City Council to focus on unhoused students in an effort to pilot innovative homelessness prevention practices. His recommendations included a housing navigator—to help people through the complicated county intake process—and security deposit assistance—which can be a barrier to renting an apartment for many poorer residents.
According to the Hayward Unified School District, over 300 students are uhoused in some way—from living with multiple families, to living in shelters, to living on the streets. Not only is this number almost certainly an undercount, these students usually also have families who are in the same situation.
Community member Ro Aguilar also called in to support those initiatives, as did Aaron Horner, Pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Hayward and Program Administrator at South Hayward Parish. Pastor Horner called for increased collaboration and for the City to continue using the Plan as it is. Former City Councilmember and current HARD Director, Sara Lamnin, also spoke in support of the plan, calling for increased collaboration, as well—especially with the Hayward Local Agencies Committee (HLAC).
HLAC is a body composed of the Hayward City Council, HUSD Board of Trustees, and HARD Board of Directors which meets quarterly to discuss items the three bodies want to collaborate on.
Council Supports Solutions, Not Sweeps
In contrast to the recent callous embrace of the Grants Pass vs. Colorado decision that has allowed San Francisco, Berkeley, and even Fremont to criminalize homelessness, the Hayward City Council focused on solutions beyond encampment sweeps. “Abatement or sweeps don’t solve the root cause of homelessness, often times those encampments pop up hours later in the exact same spot,” Councilmember Syrop said. “[I] want us to address the root causes… the Plan is comprehensive. The community did a fantastic job.”
But Councilmember Syrop stressed that a plan isn’t enough. “The plan is a wishlist,” he said, “we have to choose and prioritize where we begin and what we focus on in this plan.” He recommended prioritizing student homelessness, which is already in the Plan. “I believe that a focus on student homelessness and research and pursuing these proposed projects is aligned with our interest in being an Education City.”
A Chance For Coordination
Councilmember Bonilla also supported the focus on student homelessness, especially as a way to increase collaboration with Special District Boards. “I would like to see how that might be able to be prioritized,” he said, “and how we might be able to leverage HLAC, or other regional groups that we have, to be able to tackle the issue. I do think all of our agencies have something unique to bring to the table to deal with this issue.”
Councilmember Goldstein seemed concerned that there isn’t a coordination structure already in place. “Do we have a coordination plan in place?” he asked, “Do we have people who actually do that coordination?” Dr. Cole-Bloom said that the Police Department’s Youth and Family Services Bureau has a Behavioral Health Coordinator for people with behavioral health issues, but that was it. “We don’t do that type of coordination for folks who are homeless,” she said. “We rely on our nonprofit partners to navigate that.”
The patchwork of community services has always been an issue, and a place for large nonprofit entities to land large municipal contracts simply to guide people through a complicated process, if the City has the money to pay for it. “The lack of coordination means that there are great numbers of people who fall through the cracks,” Councilmember Goldstein said, “not for lack of resources, necessarily, but for not knowing how to access those resources… I would consider coordination as a key goal.”
This lack of coordination was supported by Councilmember Syrop’s experience working with House Hayward Now. “Some of our partners were surprised by some of the services that they were offering,” he said, “We all work within miles of each other and yet it was surprising that some folks would say, ‘Oh, I didn’t know you were doing that.’”
Councilmember Roche agreed that coordination between agencies should be a priority, as well. “Whatever we can do to coordinate and bring all this work together,” she said, “is obviously going to serve our city—serve the unhoused population.”
Who’s Gonna Pay For That Plan?
Unfortunately, doing any kind of work costs money and the City is already facing a multi-million dollar deficit. Much of the money being spent on homelessness so far comes from grants, but many on Council felt it was important to spend that money wisely. “I really like the idea… of a housing navigator,” Councilmember Roche said, “I mean that sounds great but is that really the best use of our money for the City to do or do we partner with the School District to do such a thing? Where is our money really going and what are the outcomes?”
Councilmember Bonilla stressed that one of the benefits of the Plan is a means to attract funding opportunities and to take advantage of funding when its available. Mayor Salinas, however, felt that the City had paid for enough and it was time for other agencies to pay their share. “I think the City has stepped up in very big ways to support and generate housing for all Hayward families,” he said, “If we are going to hold ourselves accountable in this space in responding to unhoused students, we also have to hold our colleagues on other bodies accountable, like the [HUSD] School Board.”
HUSD is facing a historic $55,000,000 budget deficit this year and is expected to plan cuts of at least $12,000,000 by this Spring in order to avoid County intervention.
But speaking of the County, multiple City Councilmembers mentioned Measure W funding, which had recently been freed from legal limbo. Dr. Cole-Bloom said that there were no details on the funding—it had been approved by the County Board of Supervisors only the day before—but that City Staff will be keeping an eye on it.
Why Is This So Hard?
The main reason so many people are unhoused is actually a relatively simple one: homes are too damn expensive. Everyone says there’s a housing shortage, but there’s actually an affordable housing shortage. According to an article published in the journal Housing Policy Debate, production exceeded need between 2000 and 2010 by 3,300,000 homes across the country, which more than offsets the shortage from 2010 to 2020. There isn’t even a shortage in most metropolitan areas—units sit vacant because they’re too expensive.
But since we aren’t up to the task of forcing landlords and realtors to lower prices, we instead have to find other creative ways of getting people off the street—which is often more expensive than prevention. Dr. Cole-Bloom highlighted a study from All Home that calls for a 1-2-4 strategy: for every 1 unit of interim housing, we need 2 permanent housing solutions, and prevent 4 households from going into homelessness. Prevention not only should be done the most often, but it is also often the cheapest.
“We are getting people housed,” Dr. Cole-Bloom said, “We are not stopping people from becoming unhoused. That is our biggest problem… the prevention side of things. Every time we are trying to get folks into a shelter we are, candidly, we’re putting a band aid on a pretty gaping wound that is an affordable housing crisis.” However, she also highlighted that homelessness is a political issue: a difference between visible homelessness—those you see on the streets—and invisible homelessness—those who are living in crowded or precarious situations.
When Councilmember Andrews asked about the working group to address homelessness in Weekes Park, Dr. Cole-Bloom pointed out that the best solution often isn’t the one that people like. “We can talk at length about the difference between encampment abatement and encampment resolution—meaning that the answer isn’t you get displaced from this camp and [instead] you stay here until you have a place to live—that’s a tough solution to reckon with.”
Andrews Come Lately
Councilmember Andrews arrived to the meeting late—she was in Sacramento casting the official Electoral Vote for Kamala Harris for Congressional District 14. She had her own topics to address, including culturally appropriate homelessness services. She told Dr. Cole-Bloom she had spoken to some people who said that they didn’t believe certain services were for them based solely on their name—presumably she meant groups like La Familia or Centro Legal de la Raza.
Dr. Cole-Bloom said that Community Services personnel engage directly with impacted people and explain to them explicitly that, despite the name, these services are for them. Councilmember Andrews asked for a list of Black-owned service providers—as though they were being skipped over for some reason—saying, “I’m interested in seeing a list of names.”
Councilmember Andrews also called to make HEART a 24/7 service—it currently only operates until 8pm—and was told, again, that the hold up isn’t the City is the service providers that the City contracts with. However, Dr. Cole-Bloom did say that if someone is picked up by HPD after hours, the person should be either given a hotel voucher or placed in a HEART-specific shelter bed so that the LINK team can follow-up the following morning.
Unfortunately, the HPD doesn’t necessarily have the greatest track record of engaging with homeless people in a peaceful manner.
Councilmember Andrews also pushed for an equity audit for the Plan—which had not been conducted yet. Councilmember Bonilla agreed. “[We should be] making sure all of our decisions are informed by people with lived experience and the people with lived experience, those that are representative of the people experiencing homelessness.” Not only does he want people with experience being homelessness informing the City’s work, he also wants those people to align with reality—an almost even split between Black, Latine, and White participants, for example.
Councilmember Andrews also seemed to suggest that amenities for low-income residents make a great second choice. Speaking specifically of the Mosaic development, “the affordable housing first floor is still empty,” she said, “if it’s not going to be something that’s going to attract commercial, is there an amenity… that is going to help this population?” She suggested something like a co-working space, though as the COVID lockdowns showed, the majority of low-income residents work at jobs that don’t have remote working options.
The Verdict
In the end, the City Council was supportive of the current Plan. Staff will focus on student homelessness with partner agencies, prioritizing “bang for our buck,” aligning with the County’s homelessness plans, and intentionally centering racial equity in the City’s strategies.
Nobody discussed funding, so the Plan is still mostly a wish list, but given how successful the Scattered Site Inventory plan was at getting funding, it may be easier to fund a multi-agency initiative addressing student homelessness.