A Plan to Help Ease San Diego’s Homelessness Crisis

Taking into account the high cost of living in San Diego and related factors, consider this shocking statistic from the Center for Policy Initiatives: One-third of all San Diego County residents -- or more than 970,000 – live beneath the poverty level.

Yes, it’s true.

In recent years, this economic crisis has manifested itself in our growing homeless population, a total of about 9,000 individuals, of which about 5,000 are living on the streets.

Of course, the reasons are many and varied but the main issues are well-acknowledged and widely accepted – an increasing lack of affordable housing and the continued increase in rent prices.

At LISC San Diego, we have put together a master plan.

With ideas put forth by our partners, led by the San Diego Housing Federation, this plan provides housing for 5,000 individuals currently living on the streets, while also providing an additional 2,500 new units of affordable housing.

LISC San Diego has a long history of financing affordable housing. Since 1990, we’ve invested $232 million in San Diego, which in turn leveraged an additional $1 billion to build 6,300 units saving low-income residents $30 million per year.

This plan is simple and straight-forward, and everyone – residents, business, philanthropy, and government -- has a role to play to helping to solve this crisis, as follows:

• We encourage San Diego residents to vote for the San Diego Housing Federation’s proposal for a $900 million affordable housing bond measure. Doing so will provide essential funding to make the city’s existing affordable housing properties permanent and also preserve expiring affordable housing projects, such as Peñasquitos Village in Rancho Peñasquitos.
• We ask business and philanthropy to join together to fund LISC San Diego’s $50 million Housing Affordability Fund to provide the important initial investment for predevelopment of affordable housing projects.
• We strongly encourage the City Council and County Board of Supervisors to approve an ordinance that allows for ministerial approval of all affordable and supportive housing projects.

As chief of staff for City Councilmember Marti Emerald from 2012 to ’16, I worked diligently with colleagues and elected officials to approve proposals to increase our local minimum wage, provide residents five days of sick leave, and deregulate our taxi industry.

Looking back, that was the early beginnings at City Hall of what’s recently become a national movement for a “Poor People's Agenda.” Clearly, given our alarming lack of affordable housing and the continued increase in rental rates, the “Poor People’s Agenda” remains unfinished. The time has come to finish the agenda and help the underserved and less fortunate among us.

Yes, we can … because we must.

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About LISC San Diego:
The Local Initiatives Support Corporation, known as LISC, is one of the nation’s largest nonprofit funding organizations supporting projects to revitalize communities and bring greater economic opportunity to residents. LISC receives funding from banks, corporations, foundations and government agencies to provide financing for loans, grants and equity for technical and management assistance to local partners and developers. Founded in 1991, LISC San Diego has invested $232 million in grants, loans, and equity investments in the city’s low-income communities.

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Contact: LISC San Diego
Ricardo Flores
Executive Director
LISC San Diego
c) 619-528-9058
rflores@lisc.org

Media contact:
John Freeman
Point PR Communications
c) 619-274-2779
john@pointpr1.com