Complaint Regarding the City of Chico’s Housing Obligations and Homelessness Policy

To: California Attorney General’s Housing Justice Team
Regarding: City of Chico, California
From: Scott Franzyshen, Chico, California

Request for Review

I am writing to request a review of the City of Chico’s implementation of its affordable-housing obligations and its policies concerning people experiencing homelessness.

My concern is not simply that Chico has a homelessness problem.

My concern is that, over a period of years, substantial public resources have been devoted to managing homelessness while there appears to have been comparatively little measurable progress toward creating the permanent affordable housing necessary to end homelessness.

The City has spent public resources on:

emergency shelter;
temporary shelter facilities;
encampment removal;
temporary fencing of public property;
cleanup operations;
enforcement activities;
temporary services; and
other responses associated with managing homelessness.

Many of these activities may serve legitimate immediate purposes.

However, they do not substitute for permanent housing.

A Revolving-Door System

The result appears to be a revolving-door system.

People experiencing homelessness are moved from encampments into shelters, temporary programs, or other short-term arrangements and then continue waiting for housing that remains unavailable.

Public money continues to circulate through the system while the underlying shortage of deeply affordable housing remains.

I am asking the Attorney General’s Office to examine whether the City of Chico is meeting not merely the procedural requirements of California housing law, but also the implementation requirements contained in its adopted Housing Element and related state housing requirements.

Areas I Am Requesting the State to Review

1. Implementation of Chico’s Housing Element

Has the City completed the specific:

programs;
deadlines;
zoning changes;
incentives;
affordable-housing actions; and
other commitments

contained in its adopted Housing Element?

2. Production of Affordable and Lower-Income Housing

What housing has actually been permitted and completed for:

extremely low-income households;
very low-income households;
low-income households; and
moderate-income households

compared with Chico’s stated housing needs and RHNA allocation?

3. Use of Public Housing and Homelessness Funds

How much local, state, and federal funding received or administered by the City has been directed toward:

Permanent solutions

permanent affordable housing;
deeply affordable housing;
supportive housing;
rehabilitation;
acquisition;
housing development; and
permanent exits from homelessness?

Temporary or management-oriented responses

emergency shelter;
temporary facilities;
homelessness management;
enforcement;
encampment cleanup;
fencing;
administration; and
related activities?

I believe the public deserves to know how much is being spent managing homelessness compared with actually creating housing.

4. Outcomes From Homelessness Expenditures

Are publicly funded programs being evaluated based upon permanent housing outcomes, or primarily by the number of people:

contacted;
sheltered;
served;
enrolled;
assessed; or
temporarily accommodated?

The number of people who pass through a program is not necessarily the same thing as the number of people who successfully leave homelessness.

5. Removal of Barriers to Affordable Housing

Has the City taken all actions promised in its Housing Element to:

remove governmental constraints;
facilitate affordable development;
identify suitable sites;
encourage development of lower-income housing; and
make those opportunities realistically feasible?

6. Housing Opportunities for Marginalized and Extremely Low-Income Residents

Are City policies and expenditures providing meaningful access to permanent housing for:

people with little or no income;
people with disabilities;
seniors;
people leaving homelessness; and
others who cannot afford Chico’s prevailing market rents?

7. Economic Opportunity

Where federal, state, or local programs administered by the City contain requirements or commitments concerning economic opportunity for low-income or marginalized residents, I ask that the State examine whether those commitments are actually being implemented.

This should include whether meaningful:

employment opportunities;
job training;
pathways toward self-sufficiency; and
economic participation

are being created for the populations these programs are intended to serve.

Concentration of Public Resources and Barriers to Alternative Providers

I am also concerned about the concentration of City support, access, contracts, and permissions among a relatively small group of established homeless-service providers.

Over time, a few organizations appear to receive a substantial share of the public resources devoted to homelessness in Chico, including:

funding;
contracts;
referrals;
facilities;
access to City resources; and
official participation in the City’s shelter system.

My concern is not that these organizations should receive no public support.

My concern is whether the City’s processes provide fair and meaningful opportunities for other nonprofit, community-based, faith-based, volunteer, or privately funded organizations that may wish to pursue different approaches.

Sanctioned Camping and Alternative Approaches

This concern is particularly significant regarding sanctioned camping and other low-cost alternatives.

The City has permitted or operated designated sheltering and camping arrangements under particular circumstances.

At the same time, community groups seeking to provide privately funded alternatives may face:

regulatory barriers;
permitting barriers;
land-use restrictions;
administrative barriers; or
other obstacles

that effectively prevent them from offering similar options.

This raises an important question:

If the City can allow one organization or program to operate a campsite or alternative sheltering arrangement, why are other organizations not given the same opportunity when they are willing to meet legitimate health, safety, and operational requirements?

Questions That Deserve Independent Review

I respectfully request that the State examine the following:

What criteria does the City use to determine which organizations may operate shelters, sanctioned campsites, transitional housing, or other facilities serving people experiencing homelessness?
Are those criteria written, objective, publicly available, and applied consistently?
Are City contracts and homelessness-related funding opportunities awarded through open and competitive processes?
How much City-controlled homelessness funding has gone to each provider during the past five years?
What percentage of those resources has gone to the same small group of organizations year after year?
Have other organizations applied for funding, permits, land-use approvals, operating agreements, or permission to provide alternative sheltering arrangements and been denied?
If privately funded organizations have proposed lawful sanctioned camping or other alternatives, what specific laws, zoning requirements, health and safety standards, or City policies prevented those proposals from proceeding?
Are those same standards being applied equally to programs sponsored, funded, operated, or selected by the City?
Does the City’s existing system unnecessarily restrict competition, innovation, or alternative approaches to homelessness?
Does concentrating resources and authority among a small number of incumbent providers create incentives to maintain an emergency-service system rather than expand permanent housing alternatives?

Equal Standards and Equal Access

I am particularly concerned about situations in which one organization is permitted to provide a particular type of shelter or campsite while other organizations appear unable to obtain equivalent permission, even when those organizations propose to operate with private funding.

If there are legitimate:

health;
safety;
zoning;
insurance;
environmental; or
operational

reasons for treating those proposals differently, those reasons should be transparent and consistently applied.

If there are not, then the State should determine whether the City’s practices are unnecessarily preventing additional organizations from contributing:

shelter;
housing;
employment;
transitional options; or
other innovative solutions.

Request for Review of Contracting and Funding Practices

I therefore request that the State examine Chico’s:

contracting procedures;
grant awards;
permitting decisions;
land-use approvals;
memoranda of understanding;
requests for proposals;
provider-selection processes; and
other arrangements involving homelessness-service providers.

The purpose of this review should be to determine whether public resources and opportunities are being distributed through fair, transparent, competitive, and lawful processes.

Managing Homelessness Versus Ending Homelessness

I recognize that emergency shelter, outreach, sanitation, and public-safety expenditures can be necessary.

My concern is the balance of those expenditures and whether temporary interventions have effectively become the City’s long-term response.

A system that repeatedly shelters, relocates, processes, and serves the same population without producing enough permanent housing risks institutionalizing homelessness rather than resolving it.

The question is not whether people experiencing homelessness should receive services.

They absolutely should.

The question is whether our public system has become better at managing homelessness than ending it.

Request for State Investigation

I am therefore requesting that the California Department of Justice, working with the California Department of Housing and Community Development where appropriate, review:

Chico’s Housing Element implementation;
Annual Progress Reports;
affordable-housing production;
homelessness expenditures;
relevant funding records;
contracting and provider-selection practices;
permitting and land-use decisions affecting alternative providers; and
compliance with applicable state housing laws.

I am also asking that the State determine whether Chico’s reported compliance accurately reflects what has actually been implemented and accomplished on the ground.

Supporting Documentation

I can provide supporting documentation, including:

City financial records;
Housing Element documents;
Annual Progress Reports;
Annual Action Plans;
CAPER reports;
public contracts;
City payment records;
homelessness-program information;
funding records;
public meeting records; and
other public documents.

This complaint is not intended to argue that every dollar spent on shelter or homelessness services is improper.

It is a request for accountability regarding whether Chico’s housing policies and expenditures are producing the permanent affordable-housing outcomes California’s housing laws are intended to encourage.

Closing

I believe Chico’s residents deserve a clear accounting of:

What was promised?
What was funded?
What was actually built?
Who received the money?
What outcomes were achieved?
And why are alternative solutions sometimes prevented from even being attempted?

Thank you for reviewing this matter.

Sincerely,

Scott Franzyshen
Chico, California