Oceanside\u2019s City Council received a presentation earlier this month on its efforts to end homelessness \u2014 giving insight into how tens of millions of dollars were spent on its housing-first approach.<\/p>\n
The city\u2019s efforts are handled by its Housing and Neighborhood Services department. It had a budget of $42.6 million<\/a> for the 2025-26 fiscal year, which ended in June. Over half of that budget, about $26.6 million, goes toward Section 8 rental assistance.<\/p>\n \u201cAt its core, fundamentally, the issue of homelessness is a housing issue,\u201d said Salvador Roman, senior management analyst for the city. \u201cAnd I think it\u2019s important to recognize that whether they have other needs or require other stability, the core issue will always remain addressing the housing need.\u201d<\/p>\n Housing-first vs. treatment-first is a debate that\u2019s been going on for years. Treatment-first approaches generally believe a person should be rehabbed into sobriety before any other services, such as housing, are given.<\/p>\n Housing-first is a research-backed approach that shows services, such as rehab, are more effective when someone has a consistent place to call home. Many housing-first models, such as Oceanside\u2019s, also incorporate prevention and diversion. This aims to block paths to homelessness before it happens.<\/p>\n Oceanside\u2019s 2026 point-in-time count<\/a> found 569 people experiencing homelessness. There were 362 unsheltered people counted and 207 sheltered. This year\u2019s unsheltered number was a nearly 14% increase from last year. The number of sheltered people also increased, by 19.7%.<\/p>\n The city\u2019s largest shelter is the 75-bed Oceanside Navigation Center, operated by local non-profit Interfaith Community Services<\/a>,\u00a0which is \u201cfocused on moving people into permanent housing,\u201d according to the presentation.<\/p>\n Of the 190 people served at the Navigation Center during this past fiscal year, just 10% exited the shelter with permanent housing. A little more than 12% left the shelter with access to temporary housing.<\/p>\n Terry Brown, spokesperson for the city, said this \u201cdoesn\u2019t reflect the full range of positive outcomes\u201d of people who use the Navigation Center. Brown said in a statement the 90% of people who move through the shelter who aren\u2019t placed into permanent housing could have been reunited with family, entered rehab, received mental health treatment or moved into temporary housing.<\/p>\n \u201cExiting the shelter system into stability takes different forms depending on each person\u2019s circumstances, and permanent housing is one outcome among several the City tracks and supports.\u201d<\/p>\n Oceanside\u2019s safe parking program saw similar numbers. Of 130 people served, 11 were transitioned into permanent housing with 13 going to emergency shelter. Measure X \u2014 a half-cent sales tax passed by Oceanside voters in 2024 \u2014 provides $1.5 million to the Navigation Center and $330,000 to safe parking.<\/p>\n In August 2024, Oceanside and Carlsbad shared an $11.3 million grant from the California Department of Housing and Community Development. From January 2025 until June 2027, a 3.6-mile stretch along State Route 78 has been, and will be, targeted for clearing.<\/a><\/p>\n Oceanside puts the creation of low-income housing, financial assistance and rental assistance first, with $3 million spent on tenant-based assistance and $373,000 for rapid, short-term assistance. The latter goes towards things like security deposits, first-month\u2019s rent and credit-check fees typically associated with beginning a lease. For those already on the streets, it provides outreach, shelter, supportive housing and other resources.<\/a><\/p>\n Of the city\u2019s nearly 1,400 Section 8 vouchers, 44% are 62-years-old or older, with 64% having to rely on Social Security, SSI or a pension for income. Seniors are among the fastest-growing demographic of people falling into homelessness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Oceanside\u2019s City Council received a presentation earlier this month on its efforts to end homelessness \u2014 giving insight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":464734,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[7,181,23,100,3054,3282,74,84,76,75,1696],"class_list":["post-464733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-california","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-north-county","tag-oceanside","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-county","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-top-stories-sdut"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=464733"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464733\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/464734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=464733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=464733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=464733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}