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> build more housing and put them in it

This is exactly what they want. Their contention is that SB50 doesn't place enough emphasis on affordability, so developers will mostly build market-rate housing. If you build enough market rate housing, the prices do eventually come down, but that takes a while to happen. During that time, a lot of people can lose their homes, especially since lower-income areas can be the most profitable ones to build new housing in. So the people who need it most never end up seeing the benefits of lower prices from market-rate housing, because they get kicked out of the city before those benefits kick in.

Agreed that SB50 will not fix the immediate homelessness problem; though I disagree with their belief you can't pass SB50 until it also has affordable housing units.

You can have multiple bills, we shouldn't shoot ourselves in the foot just because we have only a solution to one part of the problem.

In principle I agree with you, but in practice what often happens is that it takes a herculean effort to pass any bill at all, and politicians are more inclined to declare victory than to pass a follow-up bill. Even if they pass a follow-up bill, it may take until the next legislative session, which could mean a huge delay. This creates incentives to get the bill modified before passage.

However this is an issue of our elected officials being obtuse. California is beyond a democratic supermajority and still can’t seem to walk and chew bubble gum.

The Democratic Party is a mess of conflicting patronage. Sadly, there is still a voting constituency who does not think the wealthy should control every aspect of the lives of the working poor.

Absolutely. They will pass the bill and stop there. Very important to hold the line on this.

I disagree. The more you put into a single bill, the more natural enemies of that legislation you create. Pass what you can piece by piece. Hold the line, sure, by not letting up on the pressure after the first . . . and second . . . and third . . . bill is passed, etc.. Politicians only give up and rest on their laurels when the public loses interest.

blocking all housing in the meantime doesn't fix this problem.

It’s a bargaining device.

A very poor one given how many voters who actually vote (older, landowners, wealthier, etc.) are perfectly happy with the status quo.

> Any city will have some % of empty rentals, if it didn’t, no one would ever move around.

You do understand that people advertise apartments available for rent before the previous tenant has moved out...

In Québec, the majority of leases end on July 1st and you have a number of people moving on that day which is quite greater than the vacancy rate. You can sign a lease for a new apartment months ahead of time.

Landlords will tell you that lining one tenant up after the other is ideal, but always possible.

It’s similar to the unemployment rate, we call ~4% unemployment “full employment” since it would be impossible for every single person to have a job in a fluid job market.

> You do understand that people advertise apartments available for rent before the previous tenant has moved out...

True, but sometimes people just leave without giving warning, or the next person can't move in immediately. Sometimes, in a limited supply market, the landlord will wait for someone willing to pay a specific price since they know there's no other options.

In San Francisco, that's the case for roughly 5% of the units at any given time.

As a renter who has been casually looking for a bigger place in San Francisco for about a year (I am really picky and have a really nice place), it is my experience that decent units stay listed for at most 2 weeks and unoccupied for about 1 month.

What you describe is not the way the US rental markets I have been in worked. Even the past three properties I bought had been vacant for at least a couple months before I even looked at them, let alone closed the deal. Our current house met the Census definition of vacant for six months after we closed on it so I could do work on it before getting all our stuff in.

If the previous tenant had been there a while the landlord is often going to fix it up some--repainting walls, new carpet, new appliances. This takes some time.

In my building, the landlord takes about a week to repair and repaint before showing the unit.

Isn't like 90% of the homeless population people with a significant mental illness that they cannot provide for themselves? That's because the normal competent people don't remain homeless long and just need short term temporary assistant. Whereas the large portion of homeless actually are not competent enough to support themselves.

No [1].

Only 8% of the currently homeless population became homeless because of mental illness. People with mental illnesses are by far the most visible of the homeless, because they are crazy. But they make up a minority of the population.

18% became homeless because of drug, or alcohol abuse. 42% report drug, or alcohol usage, even if that might not be the cause of their homelessness. 39% report psychiatric issues, even if that might not be the cause of their homelessness.

[1] http://hsh.sfgov.org/wp-content/uploads/FINAL-PIT-Report-201...

Thank you for your post. I think there is often a skewed perception of people experiencing homelessness because more often than not they only see the people who have the greatest issues with mental health and addiction.

No, not even close. The nationwide rate of mental illness among homeless people is about one in four, or quadruple the rate of all people. But in the Bay Area where housing pressure is more severe the rate of mental illness among the homeless is actually lower, because there are just more “normal people” among them.

It's about 26%

Source (pg 22, Mental Illness + Alcohol / Drug Use): http://hsh.sfgov.org/wp-content/uploads/FINAL-PIT-Report-201...

It sounds like by "it" you mean the percentage of homeless with a significant mental illness..."that they cannot provide for themselves" (whatever the sentence was meant to mean). But the only 26% on that page is this:

"Over one-quarter (26%) of respondents identified job loss as the primary cause of their homelessness. "

Maybe adding an extra municipal taxes (or increased yearly tax rate) for homes that are owned but left empty would be a way to curb those who buy homes solely as an investment?

Maybe I'm forgetting an unintended negative consequences, please do share of that is the case.

> But many cities have 10%+ or higher.

Do those cities have twice as much homeless people? (or probably half as much)