SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California voters have passed a measure that will impose strict requirements on counties to spend on housing and drug treatment programs to tackle the state’s homelessness crisis.
Proposition 1 marks the first update to the state’s mental health system in 20 years and a win for Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who spent significant time and money campaigning on the measure’s behalf, raising more than $13 million to promote it with the support of law enforcement, first responders, hospitals and mayors of major cities. Opponents raised just $1,000.
Newsom celebrated after the proposition passed narrowly two weeks after election day.
“This is the biggest change in decades in how California tackles homelessness, and a victory for doing things radically different,” he said in a statement. “Now, counties and local officials must match the ambition of California voters. This historic reform will only succeed if we all kick into action immediately – state government and local leaders, together.”
The measure gives the state greater control over a voter-approved tax enacted in 2004 on millionaires for mental health services that gave counties wide latitude in how to spend it. Counties will now be required to spend about two-thirds of the money on housing and programs for homeless people with serious mental illnesses or substance abuse problems.
The initiative also allows the state to borrow $6.38 billion to build 4,350 housing units, half of which will be reserved for veterans, and add 6,800 mental health and addiction treatment beds.
Opponents, including social service providers and county officials, said the change will threaten programs that are not solely focused on housing or drug treatment but keep people from becoming homeless in the first place.
With makeshift tents lining streets and disrupting businesses in communities across the state, homelessness has become one of the most frustrating issues in California and one sure to dog Newsom should he ever mount a national campaign.
Newsom touted the proposition as the final piece in his plan to reform California’s mental health system. He has already pushed for laws that make it easier to force people with behavioral health issues into treatment.
William Elias, a television producer in Sacramento, said he “was on the fence” about Proposition 1 but decided to vote in favor of it because of the pervasive homelessness problem.
“That’s something that’s all around us right now,” he said. “We got all these tents out here in front of City Hall.”
Estrellita Vivirito, a Palm Springs resident, also voted ‘yes’ on the measure.
“It’s only logical, you know, we have to do something,” she said.
Katherine Wolf, a doctoral student at the University of California, Berkeley, said she voted ‘no’ on the measure out of concerns it would result in more people being locked up against their will.
“I was appalled of the system of laws that he has been building to kind of erode the rights of people with mental disabilities,” Wolf said of Newsom.
