Assembly Bill 255, which would allow cities to use state permanent housing dollars for drug-free housing, just passed a key hurdle
Amid a wholesale reevaluation of San Francisco’s approach to the twin crises of homelessness and drug addiction, many city leaders have been pushing for the creation of more abstinence-only supportive housing .
Now, these same leaders are cheering after a state bill that could support their efforts just passed a key hurdle, raising hopes that a legislative effort can succeed where a similar effort last year failed. Assembly Bill 255 — authored by Assemblymember Matt Haney, who represents San Francisco — would loosen regulations that currently restrict the use of state dollars towards such drug-free housing for homeless people. City leaders are already hoping to take advantage of the legislation to shift The City’s longstanding approach to long-term supportive housing. For years, San Francisco has focused on programs that allow drug users and drug-addicted people to remain housed regardless of whether they keep taking drugs. “ could turn out to be quite important to San Francisco's recovery and supporting the recovery of people with addiction in San Francisco,” said Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, who co-sponsored a May resolution in support of AB 255 that the Board of Supervisors passed unanimously. “I think it is reasonable to the point that it's ludicrous that it's been this hard to get it done.” On Friday, the state Senate Appropriations Committee approved AB 255 on a unanimous vote. Last year, Haney’s previous attempt to pass similar legislation died in the same committee, according to the assemblymember’s staff. AB 255 still must win final approval in the Legislature and then gain a signature from Governor Gavin Newsom, but backers said the win Friday has substantially improved the measure’s odds of passing. As CalMatters reported recently, hundreds of bills quietly die each year in the Senate Appropriations Committee. “I think that was the final big hurdle, at least in the legislature,” said Haney. “I'm hopeful. We worked hard to get this right.” Since Haney first introduced AB 255, it has received multiple amendments in order to address criticism from housing providers, advocates for the homeless and others who remain skeptical of sober-living facilities. Such critics warn that substance-free requirements will cause people who don’t maintain their sobriety to lose housing and end up back on the street. Those kinds of concerns have guided California homeless policy for well over 10 years. In 2016, they prompted state lawmakers to pass a “housing first” policy, which effectively means state funding can no longer be used for any housing program that makes sobriety a requirement of enrollment. Haney’s legislation peels back that restriction somewhat. If passed, AB 255 would allow cities to direct up to 10% of the money they get from the state for permanent supportive housing towards substance-free facilities. With the bill, Haney is stepping into the middle of a longstanding policy debate. Supporters of housing-first policies point to a broad body of research that suggests the less-stringent approach is far more successful in keeping people housed. Detractors of such programs, meanwhile, say that a permissive approach to drug use in shelters and supportive-housing facilities has resulted in chaotic living environments that have hampered the recovery process for many people trying to stay sober. Ex // Top Stories ‘Bay Area Then’ a throwback without foresight Exhibit a nostalgia trip at a time when we desperately need to chart a course for the future, Max Blue writes Immigration crackdown worries SF immigrants, advocates, businesses Unions and some San Francisco industries say they’re worried about the prospect of increasing ICE detainments and arrests Last Rites experiments with fermentation, cocktail innovation The tiki bar is undergoing a menu change that focuses less on mai tais and more on innovative ways to use ingredients “It's dangerous to have someone complete a successful drug treatment program and then tell them their only option now is to live in a place where recovery is not the goal, and drug use is widely tolerated,” Haney said. San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie is among those in The City who has come out firmly on the side of expanding sober-housing options. “In San Francisco, we are standing up the right kind of beds that connect people to the recovery and treatment services they need — but we need more of those services, and this bill will help us fund them,” Lurie said in a written statement to The Examiner on Friday following news that the Appropriations Committee had advanced AB 255. Haney said his measure — which is focused on long-term housing rather than shelters — will help fill a gaping hole in San Francisco’s current offerings of drug-free facilities. “We have more short-term and medium-term sober-living or recovery housing options,” Haney said. “But there's a huge gap for permanent supportive housing, where there are few options for people to live away from drugs and committed to recovery.” Among those who pushed to amend AB 255 is Sharon Rapport, a policy director for the Corporation for Supportive Housing, which supports nonprofit housing developers. She had argued that earlier versions of the legislation did not provide sufficient safeguards to ensure that people who relapse — an extremely common occurrence for those seeking to kick drug habits — would be able to remain housed. “We worked really closely with Assemblymember Haney’s staff on arriving at better language that doesn't punish people for having a severe substance use disorder,” Rapport said. Such lobbying resulted in amendments that specify that relapse cannot be a cause for eviction from state-backed supportive-housing programs. Instead, under the current version of AB 255, those who begin using drugs again sould be offered treatment. If they continue using drugs, the bill would allow them to be transferred to non-substance-free supportive housing. Critics also successfully pushed for an amendment that reduced the bill’s effect by lowering the share of state funding that cities would be allowed to dedicate to sober facilities to 10%. Originally, Haney had proposed they could devote as much as 25%. While a handful of San Francisco housing providers currently maintain sober facilities, none of them meet the requirements laid out under AB 255 regarding residents who don't maintain their sobriety to qualify for state funding, Haney said. He said that if the measure does pass, he hopes the influx of new funding will encourage local providers to expand sober-housing facilities. “I think we're going to see a lot of interest and a lot of projects and a lot of options that don't currently exist,” Haney said.
Sober Living Drug-Free Housing Matt Haney Assembly Bill 255 Ab 255
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