Guess How Long It's Been Since Newsom Launched His '10-Year Plan' to End Homelessness in San Francisco

Spencer Brown | December 19, 2023 10:00 AM

"I don't want to over-promise, but I also don't want to under-deliver — I want to hit the ground running."

Those were the words of then San Francisco Mayor-Elect Gavin Newsom in 2003 in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle about his plan to "aggressively" go after his administration's top priority: homelessness. Specifically, it was Newsom's "10-year plan for ending chronic homelessness and going after 'tens of millions' of new dollars in federal funding," the Chronicle explained at the time.

Seeking to differentiate himself from others who tried to address homelessness in San Francisco, Newsom said he was "committed" to solving the problem, somehow better than merely having an "interest" in solving homelessness.

Old Newsom called homelessness in San Francisco "a national disgrace" and said he'd "welcome being judged by how he approached the homelessness crisis" in four years when he'd again face voters and ultimately win with nearly 75 percent of the vote.

But it's now 2023 — a full two decades after Newsom announced his "10-year plan for ending chronic homelessness" and... he didn't. Contrary to the arrogant quote given to the Chronicle, Newsom both over-promised and under-delivered.

In a statement to Fox News Digital's Houston Keene, California Republican Party Chairwoman Jessica Millan Patterson slammed another decades-long Democrat failure. "Not only does the problem remain unsolved today, but in the time since, he has taken his failures statewide, where communities across California are grappling with the devastating homelessness crisis."

Patterson advised that, "[i]nstead of focusing on bashing red states or hitting the late-night talk show circuit while foolishly eyeing a promotion to the White House, Gov. Newsom should pay attention to the actual job he was elected to do."

"Not only does the problem remain unsolved today, but in the time since, he has taken his failures statewide," said CAGOP Chairwoman Jessica @MillanPatterson

"Gavin Newsom's 10-year plan to end San Francisco homelessness marks 20-year anniversary" https://t.co/H76vn7zSsZ
— CAGOP (@CAGOP) December 18, 2023

As Keene noted in his story, "as of 2022, 30% of homeless Americans lived in the Golden State, 'including half of all unsheltered people (115,491 in California; 233,832 in the US),'" according to the Public Policy Institute of California.