Senator Catherine Blakespear called on all local leaders and service providers to attend a summit on ending homelessness on Thursday.
"The point of having this summit is to say ‘we recognize this is a problem; what can we do at every level of government?’ So federal, state, county, local and the nonprofit and the philanthropic sectors," she said. "All of those sectors, working together, to try to actually reduce homelessness to a functional zero."
Blakespear said that should be the goal: finding an end to homelessness. But for that to happen, all of the levels involved in solving homelessness must engage together.
"How can we ... do more than what we are currently doing?" she said. "And bringing together everyone to have this conversation ... to identify the problem, to have actionable solutions ... that's how we actually move forward to create the better world that we want."
In a perfect world, Blakespear said she would like to see homeless-serving housing match the point-in-time count data collected every year.
That would mean enough housing for 10,263 people counted in this year's point-in-time count for the San Diego region.
That number was a 22% jump from 2022.
"The need continues to grow, but the funding is not catching up with that," said Jimmy Figueroa, the executive director of Operation Hope North County, a homeless shelter for families with children and single mothers in Vista.
"That's something that we continue to be impacted by at the shelter," he said. "We have such a great need, but our funding is limited at the housing first model ... it's limited at a high barrier model ... its limited at the prevention services model ... all across the board."
It was a pinch that many service providers throughout San Diego were feeling and was echoed during the summit.
Tamera Kohler, the CEO of the San Diego Regional Task Force on Homelessness said affording housing is the biggest issue that is forcing people into homelessness.
We need to increase housing stock while we're also measuring the numbers experiencing homelessness," Kohler said. "This is going to be a multi-year sort of approach that we have to look at, and that is why you get your elected officials, those interested in the community, the providers, people who have experience ... all sort of coming together."
But even with joint forces, Kohler says accountability for what is being done to combat homelessness will also need to be a part of the plan.
