Orange County launches new panel to get 2,700 housing units for homeless people

Members of a new governmental panel aimed at getting people out of Orange County’s streets and parks and from under freeway overpasses, and get roofs over their heads, left their first meeting Thursday with a single goal — to find money for 2,700 housing units over the next six years.

But for members of Orange County Housing Finance Trust — a new joint-powers authority that involves county and local cities — the path to that money will wind through a maze of Sacramento bureaucrats, private donors, developer fees and county and city funds. In the end, to get those homes and keep them affordable for at least 15 years, they’ll need to land about $1 billion.

Still, officials on the new nine-member panel believe they have several reasons to be optimistic.

The legislation that created the Orange County Housing Finance Trust won unanimous backing in Sacramento last year, when it was passed by the legislature and signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown. And Dan Young, the former Santa Ana mayor and Irvine Co. executive who helped create the new panel, said lawmakers remain on their side.

In Sacramento, Young said, the Orange County Housing Finance Trust is viewed as “a model for the state.”

Opting in

So far, half of Orange County’s 34 cities have joined with the county in the regional agency. The list includes 13 of the county’s 20 most populous municipalities — Anaheim, Santa Ana, Garden Grove, Fullerton, Orange, Costa Mesa, Mission Viejo, Newport Beach, Buena Park, Tustin, Laguna Niguel, La Habra and Fountain Valley. The other members are Dana Point, Laguna Beach, San Juan Capistrano, and Stanton.

The new group isn’t starting without resources.

On Tuesday, the county Board of Supervisors voted to allocate $5 million in seed money that the Orange County Housing Finance Trust can dip into for matching funds, or to use as gap financing that might help create  permanent supportive housing and affordable housing projects.

First District Supervisor Andrew Do, who also sits on the housing trust’s governing board, said the $5 million from county discretionary funds  could be “a down payment” for getting money from other sources.

And, addition to that money, county data shows there are 1,800 affordable units in some stage of development, including 800 that are already financed.

But at the Housing Trust’s meeting, on Thursday in Santa Ana, homeless advocate Thomas Fielder of Anaheim, reminded the directors and an audience of about 60 people that the county has enough discretionary funds on hand — about $900 million annually — to easily bridge any funding gap.

“We could close that gap today if the political will was there,” said Fielder, a member of the group Housing Is a Human Right, which is suing Orange County and five cities in south county over the treatment of homeless people and lack of adequate shelter.

Fielder also noted that the new group’s long-term goal — 2,700 dwellings — wouldn’t house all of the homeless people currently in Orange County.

Though different groups offer different estimates, the county’s Point in Time homeless survey from January identified 6,789 homeless people — 3,961 of them without shelter — in the county.

“Don’t congratulate yourselves too much on already having 1,800 units in the pipeline,” Fielder said. “That’s only a fraction of what we need.”

Catching up to do

The pool of money in California to provide long-term support for homeless people and build more affordable housing for other low income residents has grown recently. More money has been allocated for mental health care — which can translate into housing — and bond measures have been passed with a goal of addressing the state’s skyrocketing homeless population.

Officials in Orange County and its 34 cities have been criticized for not pursuing available housing dollars with much vigor until the past year or so. County officials have said the push hasn’t been in evidence because developers haven’t pitched many projects that would help homeless people.

Last week, three projects in Orange County were awarded a collective $11.7 million in the first round of competitive funding awards issued as part of the $2 billion “No Place Like Home” bond initiative, which was approved last year by California voters. But neighboring Riverside County — which has about 700,000 fewer people overall and a homeless population that’s about one-third the size of Orange County’s — will receive $23 million to support 162 units in four projects.

The Orange County award will pay for 35 units earmarked for homeless mentally ill residents and senior citizens. Those developments are slated to open two years from now, in Santa Ana and Yorba Linda, and the county’s Health Care Agency has committed to providing 20 years of service to the residents who will move in.

Orange County Supervisor Doug Chaffee, a former mayor of Fullerton who was elected to the county board’s Fourth District seat last year and — and one of the nine people on the Housing Finance Trust’s governing board — said all 34 cities in the county need to be engaged in identifying and securing sites where affordable housing can be developed.

“Some cities have to step up,” Chaffee said. “This trust doesn’t do anything unless you provide sites.”

The Orange County Housing Finance Trust plans to hold monthly meetings. To learn more, go to ochft.org.