[Orange County] How Orange County took big steps in 2018 to address homelessness

Blog note: this article references a grand jury report on the homelessness issue.

In 2018, Orange County reckoned with its growing — and increasingly complicated — homeless population.

The year began on a note of confrontation. It’s ending with cooperation in developing and planning strategies to provide housing and other services to homeless people.

From legal action to community engagement, it’s been a delicate balance between getting people off the streets and dealing with public safety concerns.

Lawsuits and settlements

Dating back to the 1990s, there have been lawsuits won and lost over panhandling, homeless encampments and seizure of property.

But no legal action has resulted in the broad impact and heightened expectations as the lawsuit filed Jan. 29 by Elder Law & Disability Rights Center of Santa Ana over plans to shut down tent encampments along the Santa Ana River Trail.

The county and three cities — Anaheim, Costa Mesa and Orange — were named as the defendants.

But in reality, the action — or lack of action — by the county and all 34 of its cities had been challenged. A grand jury report released in May echoed the criticisms.

It took the Catholic Worker lawsuit, along with a tandem suit brought by Legal Aid Society of Orange County, to set a showdown in motion.  U.S. District Judge David O. Carter pushed the parties to work together toward a settlement with potentially lasting impact.

From an agreement that initially saw about 700 people offered temporary motel stays by the end of February, there followed numerous court dates and conferences to work out disagreements over issues such as whether the care being offered, especially to people with mental health issues, was appropriate.

Because Santa Ana voluntarily attached itself to the lawsuit, an entrenched homeless encampment at the Civic Center also was cleared in April under Carter’s observation. About 100 people were placed in some type of shelter; another 135 reportedly “declined services.”

Then, in the last few months of the year, came settlements and proposals from other cities to add shelter beds and expand services.

Overshadowed by the riverbed lawsuit: Laguna Beach and the American Civil Liberties Union reached a settlement in a three-year-old class action  over accommodations for disabled homeless people at the city’s night shelter. The settlement was approved in November.

All about the money

In March, the Orange County Board of Supervisors approved spending a combined $90 million on permanent housing with support services, perhaps the county’s single largest appropriation to address homelessness.

But it was as much an act of contrition as volition. The money comes from long unspent Mental Health Services Act funds.

A state audit had shown that Orange County — and just about all of California’s counties — had been stockpiling money from Prop. 63, approved by voters in 2004, rather than using it on housing and services for mentally ill people.

County supervisors lay the blame on county staff for misleading them about resources, but news reports in prior years had pointed to at least $186 million cached.

After Judge Carter chastised county officials for not spending available funds, the board of supervisors stepped up in dedicating more spending on homelessness.

Other major money commitments and awards in 2018:

• The county agreed to contribute up to $10 million toward purchasing a site for a long-term 600-bed shelter in Santa Ana to replace the Courtyard emergency shelter that typically operates at its full capacity of 400 beds. Santa Ana committed $3.5 million.
• The county spent $7.5 million for a building on Anita Drive in Orange, part of a $25 million project to create an emergency mental-health and drug-abuse treatment center.
• Federal agencies awarded $2.7 million in housing assistance vouchers to assist homeless military veterans.
• The state granted the Continuum of Care system involving the county, Anaheim and Santa Ana about $15.6 million in Homeless Emergency Aid Program funds.

Passage of the bi-partisan Assembly Bill 448 paved the way for development of the Orange County Housing Finance Trust.

The county will be better positioned in 2019 to leverage hundreds of millions of dollars in government funds to help house indigent people.

The price tag for an estimated 2,700 permanent supportive housing units the county needs: $900 million.

Shelters, housing and outreach

Thousands of Irvine residents who signed petitions and protested at a board of supervisors meeting, along with push back from Huntington Beach and Laguna Niguel, resulted in the county rescinding a vote to create homeless shelters in those cities for up to 400 people.

Still, the year is ending with the county well on its way to adding close to 1,000 shelter beds in the next few months.

• Completion of the Bridges at Kraemer Place transitional shelter in Anaheim this summer brought that facility to its capacity of 200 beds.
• A county contract with WISEPlace women’s shelter in Santa Ana added 60 beds for homeless women who are victims of domestic violence.
• In November, Santa Ana opened The Link emergency shelter with 200 beds in a remarkable 28 days from start to finish.
• Anaheim began operating an interim 200-bed shelter near Angel Stadium in mid-December. It is expected to close in early 2019 with the addition of 325 beds at two other shelters, one across from Bridges at Kraemer and the other by the Salvation Army’s Lewis Street operation.

Under pressure from parents and homeowners, Tustin scrapped plans to open a 50-bed shelter next to an elementary school but chose a former U.S. Army Reserve site as the new location. The promised beds are part of Tustin’s homeless lawsuit settlement.

Other court settlements brought plans for another 50 shelter beds in Costa Mesa, up to 100 in Placentia, and another 200 or so in Buena Park.

The Salvation Army unveiled plans for a $60 million “Center of Hope” in Anaheim. The South Lewis Street campus is expected to open in about two years and offer comprehensive services that include housing, mental health and substance abuse counseling, and job placement.

Outreach and engagement

Orange County United Way’s “United to End Homelessness” campaign aimed to raise awareness and change perceptions about homelessness, with an emphasis on housing chronically homeless people. The community education sessions will continue into 2019.

December 28, 2018

The Orange County Register

By Theresa Walker