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by\u00a0Natalie Orenstein<\/a><\/strong> March 4, 2026 (Oaklandside.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/oaklandside.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/20260304-010232-780x585.webp\")
A few months into taking office, Mayor Barbara Lee created a new, high-level city office<\/a> dedicated to one of Oakland\u2019s most severe and persistent crises: homelessness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now that office has released its draft \u201cstrategic action plan<\/a>,\u201d with a goal of reducing unsheltered homelessness in Oakland by 50% in the next five years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI wish that we could have said we\u2019re going to get to functional zero in the next five years,\u201d said Sasha Hauswald, who leads the new Office of Homelessness Solutions, speaking at a February meeting of the city\u2019s Commission on Homelessness. \u201cNot to mince words, but we don\u2019t have the resources.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It would cost $3.2 billion beyond what the city and county already spends to abolish homelessness in five years, she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hauswald was not available for an interview by publication time. A city spokesperson responded to questions we sent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At last count, Oakland had an estimated 3,659 unsheltered residents and 5,485 homeless people overall \u2014 numbers that have grown dramatically over the past decade. But a tally conducted this year<\/a> will offer an updated snapshot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The plan identifies a roughly $284 million annual gap in funding, and suggests avenues to pursue to plump up city resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The vision laid out in the new 71-page document highlights strategies that have been successful<\/a>, and calls for the city to double down on those programs in the coming years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But it\u2019s also not shy about weighing in on what hasn\u2019t worked so far in Oakland and where priorities should shift, raising questions about how the administration\u2019s approach will square with a more aggressive encampment policy the council is considering. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Never miss a story.<\/strong> Sign up for The Oaklandside\u2019s free daily newsletter.<\/strong>Email<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cDespite a substantially increased pace of encampment closures in 2025, reported encampments still rose,\u201d the draft plan says. \u201cThe city lacks shelter and housing to meet the needs of unhoused individuals and without an indoor place to move, most individuals simply self-relocate to another Oakland location during encampment closures.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The plan also lays bare the severe racial disparities in the homeless population in Oakland and calls for keeping equity at the forefront of all programs and policies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The mayor\u2019s plan addresses five areas:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last summer, the city held 10 general community feedback sessions and two focus groups with people who\u2019ve experienced homelessness to inform the proposal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Oakland\u2019s \u201ctargeted prevention\u201d program is held up as one of the city\u2019s most successful strategies; the plan recommends expanding it significantly. Under this program, the city identifies households that face the greatest risk of homelessness. These risk factors, according to research, include prior homelessness, severe rent burdens, and involvement in the criminal justice system. Households with these characteristics are eligible for financial assistance, social services, and legal help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n More people enter homelessness each year in Oakland than leave it. Preventing inflow costs $6,000 to $10,000 per household, according to the city, but getting someone stable and housed once they are already homeless costs tenfold that, so it\u2019s cheaper to nip the problem in the bud before it becomes a crisis. Even so, Oakland would be left with a $21 million annual shortfall by expanding the targeted prevention program to the size the plan suggests, according to the report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Moving people from interim housing programs into permanent supportive housing also works, the city says. Most people remain housed after that step. But Oakland can\u2019t do this at the level that\u2019s needed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cShortages of effective emergency and transitional housing solutions, combined with scarcity of permanent affordable housing, have created bottlenecks where the street becomes a waiting room, and shelter becomes a long-term home,\u201d the plan says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou get placed somewhere temporary and then forgotten,\u201d says an unhoused person quoted in the report. \u201cNo plan, no timeline, no follow-up.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The city recommends funding permanent housing \u2014 the subsidies that Oakland provides to developers and social service agencies \u2014 at a significantly higher rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Oakland needs \u201c3,650 additional permanent, deeply affordable housing options\u201d to cut unsheltered homelessness in half over five years, the plan says. Put in dollar figures, that\u2019s roughly $217 million a year \u2014 or $169 million annually once you take into account existing city and county funds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cutting the size of the unsheltered population in half is an expensive endeavor, the plan makes clear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The estimated $284 million annual shortfall for meeting this goal is paired with a dearth of external resources. The state is facing an extreme deficit, and the Trump Administration is poised to tighten limitations for using federal homelessness money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One bright spot is the county\u2019s $1.83 billion sales tax Measure W. Officials have decided that 80% of revenue<\/a> will go toward homelessness, but big decisions remain on exactly how and where most of the money will be allocated. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The city says Measure W could cover 55-61% of the budget shortfall in the report, and the plan calls on Oakland officials to advocate fiercely at the federal, state, and local levels for funding. Oakland should also put forward a new bond measure for homeless housing development, it says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How the city should handle homeless camps and treat people living in them has been one of the most engrossing and divisive debates in Oakland in recent years. Last year, Councilmember Ken Houston proposed legislation<\/a> that would have the city crack down on unsheltered homelessness, towing vehicles people live in and closing more encampments, regardless of whether the city has available shelter beds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Houston has repeatedly said that allowing encampments to remain is a safety issue for both housed and unhoused people. In response to criticism that his proposal was too aggressive, he updated the legislation to say Oakland should try to offer shelter before closing a location, but refrained from requiring it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Houston\u2019s proposal has been repeatedly tabled and rescheduled, but it recently cleared a hurdle<\/a> <\/strong>when a state agency weighed in, saying his plan won\u2019t imperil state funding. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n When she spoke to the Commission on Homelessness last month, Hauswald said her office\u2019s plan is not meant to counter Houston\u2019s proposal. However, it paints a different vision for the near-future of Oakland encampments. <\/p>\n\n\n\n City closures of encampments have ballooned from 240 in 2024 to 1,212 in 2025, according to the report. This spike was due in large part to extra staff hired, large state funding awards, and priorities that shifted after Mayor Sheng Thao issued an executive order to clear more camps, the city told us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, the city estimates that while closures ramped up, encampments still grew, to over 1,900 locations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhile encampment closures are necessary to maintain usability of Oakland\u2019s parks, schools, businesses, and critical infrastructure, forced relocation has negative and racially disproportionate impacts on unsheltered people,\u201d the plan says. Because the city has insufficient shelter beds \u2014 under 1,300 for over 5,000 homeless people \u2014 the closures often \u201cforce residents into more dangerous locations,\u201d cut off their access to healthcare and service, increase the loss of critical paperwork and medications, and heighten the risk of fatal overdoses, the report says, referencing research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEvery time they sweep the camp, you lose your place in line. You lose paperwork, you lose your worker, you start over,\u201d a homeless person says in the report.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because almost half of Oakland\u2019s unsheltered residents are Black, compared to 22% of the city overall, the closures have racially disparate impacts, the plan says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The document calls for the creation of more \u201clow-sensitivity\u201d zones where unhoused people can generally live without being rousted. Presenting the plan, Hauswald said Oakland should \u201cpace\u201d its closures based on available shelter. Oakland\u2019s current rules, and Houston\u2019s proposal, define most of the city as \u201chigh-sensitivity,\u201d allowing camps to be closed more easily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the first year of the plan, the city should expand trash pick-up and sanitation services at camps \u2014 something homeless people have long called for \u2014 increase outreach, and reinforce expectations that unsheltered residents be \u201cgood neighbors\u201d to surrounding businesses and people, the report says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe need to bring down the temperature, and bring a basic level of health and sanitation to our neighborhoods and to our unhoused neighbors,\u201d Hauswald said at the February commission meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She said the plan is \u201cnot intended to set a stake on one side of the convo. Nobody wants homelessness in Oakland\u2026The polarizing nature of the convo is harming our ability to make practical progress.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n If both were adopted by the City Council, Houston\u2019s legislation \u201cwould prevail over\u201d the action plan, city spokesperson Jean Walsh said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n A representative for Houston, speaking at a council committee meeting last week, praised Hauswald\u2019s commission presentation but said the councilmember was frustrated that he wasn\u2019t briefed on it in advance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n DONATE<\/strong><\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n natalie@oaklandside.org<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Natalie Orenstein is a senior reporter covering City Hall, housing and homelessness for The Oaklandside. Her reporting on a flood of eviction cases following the end of the Alameda County pandemic moratorium won recognition from the Society of Professional Reporters NorCal in 2024. Natalie was previously on staff at Berkeleyside, where she covered education, including extensive, award-winning reporting on the legacy of school desegregation in Berkeley Unified. Natalie lives in Oakland, grew up in Berkeley, and has only left her beloved East Bay once, to attend Pomona College.More by Natalie Orenstein<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Mayor Lee\u2019s homelessness office has issued a bold report. But funding is short, and there\u2019s a different plan already on the table. by\u00a0Natalie Orenstein March 4, 2026 (Oaklandside.org) A few months into taking office, Mayor Barbara Lee created a new, high-level city office dedicated to one of Oakland\u2019s most severe and persistent… Continue reading Ramping up what\u2019s working already<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Accessing Measure W dollars and a new bond measure?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Another controversial encampment policy already on the table<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Natalie Orenstein<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n