Three Democratic California lawmakers – Sen. Alex Padilla and Reps. Ted Lieu and Salud Carbajal – have reintroduced the Housing for All Act to finance federal and local programs designed to address the homelessness crisis that worsened during the Biden administration.
The Biden administration insisted it had “tackled the nation’s homelessness crisis with the urgency it demands” since taking office in 2021. However, last year the Biden administration reported an 18.1% increase in homelessness, which followed a 12% rise recorded in 2023. More than 770,000 people were counted as homeless, although it is believed the number is significantly higher.
The bill’s key provisions call for increased investments in federal initiatives including the National Housing Trust Fund, the HOME Investment Partnerships program, the Section 202 Supportive Housing for the Elderly Program, the Section 811 Supportive Housing for People with Disabilities program, Housing Choice Vouchers, Project-Based Rental Assistance and Continuums of Care.
The bill also supports locally developed approaches by investing in hotel and motel conversions to permanent supportive housing with supportive services, the Eviction Protection Grant Program, mobile crisis intervention teams, and what the lawmakers defined as “culturally competent, trauma-informed behavioral health and homelessness services.”
“Housing is a basic human right, not a privilege,” said Padilla. “As the Trump Administration callously cuts essential housing programs and resources that Americans across the country depend on, our Housing for All Act is a blueprint for building upon locally developed solutions and providing necessary federal investments to finally treat the homelessness and affordable housing crises with the seriousness they deserve.”
The bill, which is co-sponsored only by Democratic senators and representatives, is endorsed by several housing organizations including the National Low Income Housing Coalition, the National Rural Housing Coalition and the California Housing Partnership.
I thought California wanted to be a “sanctuary state” means they want federal money from every other state’s taxpayers to fund it?? Did you not think about this when you opened the borders?
How about not allowing landlords to increase rents when they buy a multi unit. Rent should only be allowed to be increased if they make substantial improvements to the property and then not more than 10 %.
What if all the immigrants who came across the border to do the dirty jobs that native born Americans are too good to do, stopped doing this work for 10 days? You can pick your own vegetables, work in slaughter houses and wipe the rear ends of patients in nursing homes.
Native born Americans are NOT too proud to do manual labor. Your insults to Americans is salt on the wound of all Americans who are already suffering!
The rental market is quite competitive. Limiting increases overlooks rising costs including rising taxes, rising insurance, rising labor costs, rising repair costs and rising mortgage costs. Rents are best left to the market not the government. History tells us any type of rent control leads to disaster (New York City when buildings were being abandoned because owners couldn’t pay for city required repairs). Native born people do the work you speak of daily across the nation, for example: My father in-law is being well cared for in Christian City a well known and well respected elder care facility in South metro Atlanta. It appears you know not whereof you speak. Think again.
Heidi, I feel so sorry for you. Do you really believe that legal Americans don’t work in meanial jobs? Also Rent control is never the answer.
Landlords should not be penalized for owing property to lease to others or investors will stop buying property, which will increase the housing shortage.
I do believe the government should incentivize landlords to make housing more affordable by lowering taxes, give insurance incentives and lower mortgage rates for those who buy rental properties. That will increase investors buying more property to rent and create more affordable housing for all Americans.
The Dems are creating another useless programs to pocket our tax dollars. I can feel our tax going up reading this article. Upsetting.
ridiculous Heidi. Landlords are private investors who.mustbrisk their own capital and efforts in hopes of a profit. unlike elected officials who’ve never worked in the private sector. Raising rents is determined by the free market, not homeless people without jobs. Anytime the government gets involved in the private sector, including apartments, the privatebrisk-taking investors and mom-n-pop owners get the shaft
This is nothing less than more Socialist wet-dream lunacy from the usual suspects. “Housing is a basic human right…” Seriously?? Jefferson said, “The best defense of democracy is an informed electorate.” Well, if the informed California electorate has seen fit to vote nonsense-spewing clowns like Padilla, into the U.S. Senate, and Reps. Lieu and Carbajal into the House, it goes a long way to explain why we’re in the existential mess we currently find ourselves in. $36 trillion national debt with interest payments now approaching one trillion dollars a year, and these fools want the taxpayers to fund “free housing” for all the homeless because it’s “a basic human right, not a privilege.” It would seem their understanding of what a right is compares well to AOC’s ability to define capitalism. Nothing can be called a “right” if the exercising of that right requires the forced confiscation of the fruits of another’s labor. (If you are a California voter or someone who doesn’t understand this basic concept, allow me to elaborate in three simple steps: 1. To provide “free housing” requires a great deal of taxpayer funds. 2. Taxpayer funds are derived primarily from the salaries of tax-paying American citizens. 3. When a portion of that hard-working citizen’s pay is taken – involuntarily – from that worker and given to the government in order to provide a “free” benefit to someone else, that’s not exercising a “right”, that’s implementing slavery.) In other words, NOTHING CAN BE CALLED A RIGHT IF THE EXERCISING OF THAT RIGHT VIOLATES THE RIGHTS OF ANOTHER.
So, how about this alternative plan, Sen. Padilla and Reps. Lieu and Carbajal? The combined wealth of the top 50 Hollywood actors is about $34 billion (i.e. these fortunate and extraordinarily wealthy individuals possess far more money than any one person “needs”, and they have clearly NOT been paying their “fair share”.) Now, if you work with your empathetic California governor to pass much-needed “wealth tax” legislation mandating the “required sharing” of just two-thirds of that enormous total, you’ll have around $22 billion worth of “free housing” funds to help exercise the “rights” of the California homeless. I’d call that a good start, wouldn’t you? (P.S. Be sure to make that requirement closer to three-fourths for staunch homeless advocates like Larry David.)
Gabe, you hit the nail squarely on the, do very well said.
Democrats have no agenda, other than
To throw our hard earned at their pet projects. It has been proven so many times, money does not solve the homeless problem🤦🏻♀️💜
Thank you, Tina. I know writing a rant like that is like spitting in the rain, but it’s nice to know there are a few kindred spirits such as yourself out there who recognize and share my disappointment with the sad state of our country. There are, no doubt, still a lot of patriotic, liberty-loving “good people” in this country, but to paraphrase the old saying, “All that is necessary for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing.” And there are sadly a lot of good people out there doing precisely that.
There’s one thing we can be assured of; Homelessness will never be resolved.
The greatest impact against homelessness – and no one thing fixes it – will be the effect of years of hugely decreased illegal immigration (millions taking lowest level jobs and cheapest housing from our most vulnerable citizens) and Prop 36 making drugs illegal again, and all that creates a more secure border and constricts the supply of drugs to our streets. Expecting immigrants to “pick vegetables, work slaughter houses and wipe butts” sounds like endorsing exploitation of another vulnerable class. Declarations like “housing is a human right” and “Rent increases should be controlled by the state” ignore cost. A deliberate ommission in every socialist argument for state control over privately owned assets is “we won’t (because we can’t) advocate control over interest on landlords loans, insurance, taxes, labor costs and the other hundred cost factors that make a phrase like “affordable housing” an oxymoron. There is no such thing except where it’s not an issue. Link together enough false assumptions and incorrect assessments of human nature and you can structure perfectly wrong theories. Many government paid programs like some mentioned are working the edges of the problem and signal the truth, which is if the government wants to control housing rents they can build their own housing. Stealing from property owners with laws to restrict their rents and rights is different.
You are ABSOLUTELY correct. Once Trump STOPS ILLEGAL immigration, Homeless Americans can get jobs and housing because money will be available that once was given to those who broke our laws!
Democrats love spending exorbitant amounts of money with zero proof of concept or care for efficacy of taxpayer funds or if it even solves a problem. Democrat leadership in Austin began spending tens of millions on hotel conversions (many of which were purchased for millions over appraised values) without any proof that it works with trying it on just one first. Now, it’s been a huge failure and now we’re on the hook as taxpayer for millions annually to keep them staffed, maintained, and funded.
Honestly, democrats use homeless initiatives as a massive money laundering scheme. They audited spending in Austin on bonds that were for homelessness and they couldn’t trace $72-73 MILLION. Just never found out what happened to it. That’s what they do and the blue voters keep throwing money at them with their votes. It’s ignorance.