Santa Clara County Homelessness Articles

San Francisco provides all tenants facing eviction access to an attorney. Across the Bay, in Contra Costa County, it’s a different story. Two tenants’ stories show the difference a lawyer can make.

California lawmakers made an effort in 2023 to remove red tape around new affordable houses, but obstacles such as high interest rates, sluggish local approval processes and a shortage of skilled construction workers remain.

Jan Bernstein Chargin (right) was instrumental in heading up the Homeless Memorial Day at City Hall in Gilroy on Dec. 21. Photo: Tarmo Hannula
An inaugural ceremony in Gilroy to recognize people that died over the year while unhoused was …

Why did the homelessness crisis become more dire in 2023, even as the Legislature passed more affordable housing laws? Home prices and rents are still increasing.

The state has hundreds of millions to spend on affordable housing. Developers say they need billions.

California is modernizing how it pays health care providers through Medi-Cal. Some mental health providers say the changes endanger their services.

Local officials counted on the state’s Homekey program to convert hotel rooms. But now a major developer has defaulted on loans and the state housing department is investigating.

California’s rent cap doesn’t apply to some kinds of low-income housing, which has its own rules. But with inflation, some tenants have gotten much higher rent increases, even though affordable units were built with taxpayer subsidies.

California's homelessness numbers continue to rise despite new spending on housing, services. Here's where the fight to end the crisis stands. This story has been updated for 2022 and 2023.

Poverty in California was reduced by record levels during the COVID pandemic, but now those economic support programs have come to an end and poverty is on the rise again.

More than 70,000 households who needed and applied for state aid to pay their rent during the COVID-19 pandemic by the March 2022 deadline still have their applications listed as "pending." Now they could be evicted from their homes.

The number of Californians facing eviction was relatively low for years during a lengthy statewide moratorium. In the year after it ended, cases soared and still remain high in large counties.

Second Harvest Food Bank Santa Cruz County CEO Erica Padilla-Chavez looks at food insecurity as a symptom of an underlying disorder—one that can be cured.

A tiny home project building bicycle-locker-sized enclosures in Santa Cruz morphed into Simply Shelter and expanded to San Jose.

A hotel in Hollywood is receiving more than twice it would get per room by renting to the city of Los Angeles rather than to long-term tenants.

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s signature mental health policies allow the involuntary treatment of more Californians with severe mental illnesses. Some fear the new laws will infringe on the civil liberties of people confined against their will.

Police can’t force homeless people from encampments unless the city in question has “adequate shelter” for those who are displaced, according to courts. Now everyone involved wants to know what “adequate” means.

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s big new experiment to push people with mental illness off the streets and into treatment starts this fall. Counties responsible for the rollout say it may end up being more modest than advertised.

On Aug. 22, the Valley Water Board of Directors allocated additional resources to support greater service and coordination toward cleaning up trash, debris and hazardous pollutants produced by encampments along waterways in Santa Clara County. The board approved two new …