Governor Gavin Newsom (D-CA) published his 2019-2020 proposed budget summary. In total, the Budget includes $7.7 billion across multiple departments and programs to address housing and homelessness throughout the state. The proposed new funding in the budget includes:

  • $500 million for jurisdictions that site and build emergency shelters, navigation centers or supportive housing, with $300 million for regional planning and $200 million for meeting milestones.
  • $25 million per year for the Housing and Disability Advocacy program to assist homeless, disabled individuals with applying for disability benefit programs, while also providing housing supports.
  • $100 million for Whole Person Care Pilot programs that provide housing services.
  • $750 million to jump-start housing production: $250 million in grants to jurisdictions to support technical assistance and staffing and $500 million of funding for general purposes for reaching milestones like rezoning for greater density, completing environmental clearance, permitting units and revamping local processes to speed up production.
  • $500 million for the development of housing for moderate-income households through the California Housing Finance Agency’s Mixed-Income Loan Program which serves households with incomes between 60 and 80 percent of Area Median Income.

The budget also contains:

  • An innovation challenge for developers to build demonstration projects that use creative and streamlined approaches to building affordable and mixed-income housing on excess state properties.
  • Changes to state law that would conform with federal law allowing for deferred and reduced taxes on capital gains in opportunity zones (OZs) for investments in green technology or in affordable housing, and for excluding gains on such investments in OZs held for 10 or more years.
  • A proposal to pair enhanced infrastructure financing districts with OZs. The budget calls on the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development to explore layering additional programs to increase the production of affordable housing.