In July 2024, Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered California agencies to “urgently” close homeless encampments on state property, aiming to show local officials that the state is leading by example in responding to homelessness.
“There are simply no more excuses,” the governor said in a statement announcing the directive. “It’s time for everyone to do their part.”
But during the four months after Newsom’s announcement, the number of encampment closures initiated by the California Department of Transportation — the primary state agency tasked with clearing camps from along highways and under freeway overpasses — plummeted.
Newsom issued the order on July 25, 2024. In both May and June of that year, Caltrans cleared more than 850 encampments, according to the data obtained by this news organization. In July, the number fell to 563. By November, it was just 300.
Neither the governor’s office nor Caltrans provided more recent statewide numbers. The Bay Area News Group filed an initial public records request in December last year, but received the data in late September.
Newsom’s office attributed the drop-off to “the support the state has provided local governments to create effective programs addressing the housing and homelessness crisis.” It also pointed to recent agreements with cities to allow local crews to clear camps on state property.
“There may simply be fewer encampments to clean up on state-rights-of way,” his office said in a statement.
But Caroline Grinder, legislative advocate with the League of California Cities, which represents most of the state’s 482 cities, said 40% of surveyed cities indicated “coordinating with state agencies was a barrier to addressing encampments.”
“The Governor’s executive order on encampments has shown some results, but a more coordinated effort with the state is required if we are to make more measurable progress and humanely address the needs of our residents,” Grinder said. “Cities of all sizes are committed to working with Caltrans, but face delays and communication barriers.”
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San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, a vocal critic of Newom’s response to quality-of-life issues, said that even as his city works with Caltrans to close camps, the agency’s local “right of way is consistently re-encamped and continues to be a public safety hazard and source of blight.”
This week, Newsom announced that “after months of negotiations,” the state had reached an agreement with San Jose to allow the city to clear encampments on Caltrans property, joining 21 other cities with similar agreements.
“As a former mayor myself, I get how tough local management can be — but this is what partnership looks like,” Newsom, a former San Francisco mayor, said in a statement.
Mahan said he was caught off guard by the governor’s news release. He said the city first reached out to the state about the agreement two years ago and had pushed to finalize it as soon as possible, adding that Caltrans “does not have the capacity to properly manage encampments.”
Tara Gallegos, deputy director of communications for the governor’s office, responded, “There’s no drama here, as much as the mayor seems to want to create one.”
According to the governor’s news release, Caltrans removed 115 encampments in San Jose from July 1, 2024, through June 30, 2025, a 53% increase from the previous fiscal year. But the governor’s office did not provide data. Agency data provided in response to this news organization’s request did not show figures beyond November 2024, or indicate a significant increase in Caltrans encampment closures in the city in the initial months after the July 2024 executive order.
Caltrans did not provide a response to criticisms raised by local officials or questions about the decline in camp closures last year.
Since Newsom took office in 2019, his administration has funneled more than $27 billion to support local governments in combating homelessness, including funding thousands of supportive housing and shelter units, as well as street outreach programs and encampment abatements across the state. Even so, California’s homeless population swelled to more than 187,000 last year, a 24% increase since Newsom became governor.
Even as some large cities and counties have recently reported encouraging declines in homelessness, the crisis remains a political liability for Newsom, said Dan Schnur, a political science professor at UC Berkeley and the University of Southern California.
“He and his team recognize this is a significant vulnerability, so he devotes a lot of time in public talking about this issue and how he’s going to solve it,” Schnur said.
But as Newsom eyes a presidential run, it’s not hard to imagine his office’s optimistic explanation for the drop in Caltrans encampment closures being “superimposed over footage of a homeless camp in downtown San Francisco or San Jose” during a campaign opponent’s TV ad, Schnur added.
Newsom’s order on encampments came just weeks after a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision granted officials greater authority to clear homeless camps. Still, the specific changes in the order itself were relatively limited.
The directive only applies to encampments on state property and doesn’t require local governments to take action to clear them. Additionally, many of the updates in the three-page order, including guidelines for connecting camp residents with services, were already in place at Caltrans.
“Policy-wise, I don’t really see anything that’s a change,” said Alex Visotzky, senior California policy fellow at the National Alliance to End Homelessness. “It was more of a signal to Caltrans to put more of their resources into closing encampments, and a signal to local governments to do so or face the consternation of the state.”
Since issuing the order, Newsom has repeatedly threatened to withhold homelessness funding from jurisdictions the state deems aren’t doing enough to clean up the streets and move people indoors. Earlier this year, he released a “model ordinance” for local governments that would largely ban public camping.
Local officials appear to have received the message. Dozens of cities — under pressure from both the governor and a public increasingly exasperated by homelessness — have adopted new policies to more aggressively clear encampments.
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Advocates for homeless people have denounced the moves, contending that dismantling camps can traumatize unhoused residents and often achieves little except to push them from one neighborhood to another.
In an effort to enhance coordination with local governments on closing encampments and connecting homeless people with services, Newsom in August launched the State Action for Facilitation on Encampments (SAFE) Task Force. The initiative aims to partner with California’s 10 largest cities, including San Jose, Oakland and San Francisco.
In a news release last week announcing the task force’s closure of camps in Fresno and San Diego, Newsom touted the efforts for demonstrating “how together we can address homelessness with urgency, compassion, and accountability.” The mayors of both cities thanked Newsom in the release.
But Visotzky, with the Alliance to End Homelessness, argued that until communities across the state can add much more affordable housing, closing camps is an ineffective response to solving the crisis.
“Unfortunately, the number of encampments removed is really not an indicator of success,” he said. “An indicator of success in addressing encampments is how many people got back into housing.”
