Trump cuts funding for permanent housing. Advocates say this will lead to more homelessness

From CalMatters homelessness reporter Marisa Kendall: 

For weeks, California’s homeless service providers have worried about rumors that the federal government was going to cut funds for permanent housing.

Now, those cuts are here. Shortly after the federal government reopened, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development issued a policy change that will shift the majority of federal homelessness funds away from permanent housing and into temporary shelter. 

Each jurisdiction applying for a piece of about $4 billion in federal homelessness funds during the 2025 fiscal year can now spend no more than 30% of their grant on permanent housing. That’s a major change. For years, the federal government and California cities and counties have prioritized permanent housing as the long-term solution to homelessness. Los Angeles County, for example, dedicates more than 80% of its federal funds to permanent housing. 

President Donald Trump’s administration instead wants cities and counties to focus on temporary shelters that get people off the street quickly, and on programs that require people to participate in addiction treatment. 

• Scott Turner, HUD Secretary: “We are stopping the Biden-era slush fund that fueled the homelessness crisis, shut out faith-based providers simply because of their values, and incentivized never-ending government dependency.”

The National Homelessness Law Center says these changes will force about 170,000 people nationwide out of subsidized housing and back onto the street.

• Jesse Rabinowitz, spokesperson: “Trump’s approach towards homelessness will worsen the lives of most people, waste taxpayer money, and instead direct taxpayer dollars towards debunked, disproven, and failed approaches to homelessness.”

The new policy also attacks organizations’ diversity and inclusion efforts; support of transgender clients; and use of “harm reduction” strategies that seek to reduce overdose deaths by helping people in active addiction use drugs more safely. Federal funds cannot be used for projects that further any of those efforts.

A California federal judge handed the Trump administration another loss on Friday, writing in a preliminary ruling that its demand for UCLA to pay a $1.2-billion settlement or risk continued funding freezes on research grants is unlawful, writes CalMatters’ Mikhail Zinshteyn.

Siding with University of California scientists, professors, graduate students and other staff, Judge Rita Lin called Trump’s actions towards the public university “coercive and retaliatory.” Her ruling goes beyond just UCLA, and limits the Trump administration’s ability to withhold current and future grant funding for the entire UC system. 

This summer, the Trump administration accused UCLA of not doing enough to combat antisemitism during last year’s pro-Palestine protests, and for allegedly violating federal civil rights law. It sought a $1.2-billion settlement agreement from UCLA to have the campus comply with terms that would have severely hamstrung the institution’s academic freedoms and diversity efforts.

The administration could appeal Lin’s ruling, and the full merits of the case is still wending its way through the courts.

Read more here.

Speaking of the UCLA case: The administration’s leverage over UCLA has remained unclear for months, ever since Lin ordered it to restore nearly all those grants — totaling more than $500 million — in August and September. Mikhail and video strategy director Robert Meeks have a video segment on the rulings for the restoration of those grants as part of our partnership with PBS SoCal. Watch it here.

SoCalMatters airs at 5:58 p.m. weekdays on PBS SoCal.

Let’s dive into some environmental news:

• The impact of data centers: Electricity use and carbon emissions by power-hungry California data centers nearly doubled between 2019 and 2023, a new report says. Published by environmental think tank Next 10 and a UC Riverside researcher, the report also estimates that public health costs from air pollution associated with data centers have potentially risen from $45 million to more than $155 million within the same time frame. Read more from CalMatters’ Alejandro Lazo.

• Dangerous debris flow: Though evacuation orders were lifted over the weekend for L.A. County and other parts of Southern California, officials are urging residents to stay alert as wet weather is still expected through early this week. Areas recently ravaged by wildfires, including January’s Eaton and Palisades fires, are especially vulnerable to debris flow and mudslides since these fire-scarred regions have little vegetation to stabilize the earth. Described as “a flood on steroids” by one researcher, debris flow is a problem in Southern California in particular because of the area’s steep topography. Read more from CalMatters’ Rachel Becker.

Building affordable housing on the California coast should get a bit easier after the California Coastal Commission voted earlier this month to extend the time frame for projects to be built — a decision that underscores a pro-housing shift among the little-known but consequential government body.

As CalMatters’ Nadia Lathan explains, the commission was created in the 1970s to oversee the protection of California’s 800-mile coastline, including its natural habitats and the public’s access to beaches. Many housing advocates and Democrats say the state agency blocks affordable housing development in California’s coastal regions. 

This year, Gov. Gavin Newsom, a critic of the commission’s broad powers, and Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas, a Salinas Democrat, appointed three pro-development local officials to the agency.

The agency also this year worked with housing activists to boost student housing in coastal cities, and did not oppose a housing reform law that excludes most new developments from environmental review.

Read more here.

Could California see a single-payer health plan that would cover medical costs for all? One Democratic candidate for governor floated the idea at a recent forum on health care issues affecting California. But another candidate criticized the plan as unrealistic. Find out which policies candidates are pushing and more from CalMatters’ Ana B. Ibarra.