DAN WALTERS | CALMatters
Being what it is, California has a mélange of complex public policy issues – some of them fully blown crises – that defy resolution year after year, decade after decade.
Rather than recognize and deal with their complexities, the state’s politicians tend to condense responses into money. K-12 education exemplifies the syndrome. The state’s nearly 6 million public school students perennially fail to make the cut in national tests of academic achievement, often trailing states that spend far less per-pupil on their schools.
It indicates that money is only one factor, and perhaps not the most important one, in educating children. Nevertheless, the political debate over the state’s educational deficiencies begins and ends with how much money is being spent, thereby providing a convenient excuse for failure.
California’s newest crisis, the nation’s highest level of homelessness in both absolute and relative terms, is following a similar arc. Why upwards of 200,000 Californians, and probably more, are homeless involves factors that, much like educational aptitude, are as individual as fingerprints. While theories on causes and potential cures abound, once again the politics of the issue is focused on money – how much to spend, who spends it and who, if anyone, is held accountable for outcomes.
The politics of homelessness – or rather of spending on homelessness – appear to be entering a very contentious phase. Early in his governorship, Gavin Newsom appointed himself as the state’s homelessness czar and during the first three years of his governorship (2018-21) the state spent nearly $10 billion on battling the social malady, according to a new state report.
The money paid for 35 different programs administered by nine different state agencies.
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