Trailers for homeless headed to Sonoma County, Gov. Newsom says

California will provide Sonoma County with travel trailers to house dozens of locals without a stable residence, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Wednesday during a State of the State address with an unusually heavy focus on homelessness.

The first-term governor, addressing the Legislature in Sacramento, also urged lawmakers to support his proposal to place $750 million in a fund to boost housing and address homelessness. Newsom said he also wanted more ongoing money to fuel a meaningful response to homelessness - a crisis affecting about 3,000 people in Sonoma County that is particularly prevalent in California, home to nearly half of the country’s unsheltered homeless people.

“The public has lost patience, you have all lost patience, and so have I,” Newsom told legislators.

The county requested the 10 trailers it will receive back in January, shortly before the closure of a large homeless encampment on the Joe Rodota Trail, a county park in west Santa Rosa that at one point was home to more than 250 people. County officials have not publicly identified where they may place the trailers, which could house up to 60 people and are likely to raise qualms from some neighbors, Supervisor James Gore acknowledged.

“No matter where you choose, people are going to have concerns,” said Gore, who has advocated for Sonoma County to receive the trailers and who was in Sacramento for Newsom’s speech. Gore added he expects county staff to prepare a list of potential sites for the board to winnow down at its March 10 meeting.

Newsom’s speech piqued Gore’s attention in several places, particularly the governor’s pledge to tie state homelessness dollars for local use to “clear metrics,” including the numbers of new leases signed, new homes built and people moved off the streets - an approach that makes sense to Gore.

“I don’t believe that we can talk about local control without delivering local results,” Gore said.

Contra Costa, Santa Clara and Riverside counties and the city of Stockton also will receive trailers, Newsom said, following a first round of trailers last month in which 15 went to Oakland and 30 to Los Angeles County.

Newsom also announced that state officials would make available 286 pieces of state property for local governments across California to freely use for homelessness solutions and directed Caltrans to “make better use of other unoccupied space to get homeless housing up as fast as possible.”

The governor’s office confirmed that some of these state-owned parcels are in Sonoma County but did not specify how many or where.

Newsom’s stated plan of action calls for moving people off the street “quickly and humanely” with a focus on “getting the mentally ill out of tents and into treatment.” He tied California’s homelessness crisis to the failures of the past, including racial discrimination and insufficient housing construction.

A nonpartisan analysis of his plan from the state Legislative Analyst’s Office found that Newsom’s $750 million proposal - which would differ from past strategies of awarding grants to local governments - “falls short of articulating a clear strategy for curbing homelessness in California.”

After an introduction touting California’s accomplishments, the governor’s speech focused mostly on homelessness while making room for some critical allusions to President Donald Trump, who is visiting California this week. The president has threatened federal intervention to address the state’s homelessness crisis, and Newsom, a Democrat, noted Wednesday that the White House’s recent budget for the Department of Housing and Urban Development proposed steep cuts for the agency.

“I’m old enough to remember when HUD was in the housing business. And I’m hopeful it will be again,” Newsom said. “After all, homelessness isn’t a blue or a red issue. It’s an everyone issue - a blight on the soul of America.”

You can reach Staff Writer Will Schmitt at ?707-521-5207 or will.schmitt@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter ?@wsreports.