Spending large amounts of public money on homeless services and housing subsidies allows politicians to seem to be doing something about a problem that has rightly risen to the top of California voters’ concerns. And in a state governed by Democratic supermajorities and general acceptance of big state and local budgets, it has the additional advantage of being relatively easy.

The problem, as a new analysis points out, is that it doesn’t work. California accounted for more than the entire national increase in homelessness last year, and its slumping housing construction and soaring prices promise to exacerbate the shortage of homes and push even more people to the brink.

What Sacramento lacks is not the will to spend still more but “a clear strategy for the state’s response to the homelessness crisis,” the Legislative Analyst’s Office reported this week. “Even substantial investments in resources could quickly dissipate without demonstrating much progress if investments are made without a clear plan.”

The Legislature’s nonpartisan research arm made that pointed observation in light of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposal to spend an additional $1.4 billion on homelessness in the next fiscal year. That would come on top of more than $3.1 billion in new expenditures over the past two years.

Substantially reducing the ranks and suffering of more than 150,000 homeless Californians would be well worth the expense, but the state and its cities have watched homelessness grow as surely as the budgets they dedicate to the problem. Legislative analysts raised the further concern that by creating a new state bureaucracy with regional administrators, Newsom’s proposal would aggravate the fragmentation that fuels spending but hampers accountability.

The report says clear goals and responsibilities along with rigorous oversight would make the state’s spending more effective. The governor’s homelessness task force has suggested two appropriate steps in that direction: a state homelessness czar and, more important, an enforceable mandate to provide shelter for the state’s residents. But Newsom has so far hesitated to follow that advice.

The state’s inability to stem homelessness parallels its failure to address the housing shortage at its root. While the Legislature has allocated billions to housing subsidies, it hasn’t addressed the regulatory barriers to construction. On both counts, California needs better laws, not just bigger budgets.

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