SACRAMENTO, Calif. — After criticizing local officials for failing to adequately address the pernicious problem of homelessness in California, Gov. Gavin Newsom on Thursday announced that the state is on track to cut the number of unsheltered people by an ambitious 15% in two years and vowed to provide 1,200 tiny homes to help achieve that goal.
The announcement kicked off Newsom’s atypical State of the State tour around California, which replaces a speech outlining his political agenda that governors traditionally deliver annually to the state Legislature at the Capitol. Newsom, who dislikes reading off teleprompters because of his dyslexia, is instead taking his speech on the road this year and intends to make policy announcements at stops in Sacramento, the Bay Area, Los Angeles and San Diego through the weekend.
Three years ago and weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic forced a state of emergency, Newsom dedicated his entire address to homelessness and his commitment to ending it. Newsom called the crisis a disgrace to California and said it was his “calling” to alleviate that human misery.
