On December 9th, the San Jose City Council voted on whether to allocate $5.5 million towards the Homelessness Prevention System (HPS) for the upcoming year. They also proposed a more stringent outcome reporting system to ensure that public funds truly contribute to housing stability and enhance the effectiveness of assistance programs.
If the budget is approved, it will retroactively take effect from July 1st and continue until December 31, 2026. Mayor Matt Mahan and several city council members have requested the city manager to regularly publish key program indicators, including the total number of assisted families, expenditure distribution by district, assistance costs per household, and whether families are still able to maintain housing two years later. This is intended to enhance transparency, accountability, and serve as a crucial basis for future funding allocations.
According to a press release from the city government, San Jose is the only city in Santa Clara County that has significantly invested in the HPS. Over the past year, the system has helped 1,800 families avoid homelessness, with 1,238 of them being San Jose residents. In the next two years, with joint investments from the county government and the nonprofit organization Destination: Home, the overall budget will exceed $21 million, expected to assist over 2,000 additional families in avoiding homelessness.
Mayor Mahan stated that for families facing eviction, “timely small amounts of assistance often enable them to avoid years of instability, which is more cost-effective than waiting to assist after a crisis has escalated”. He emphasized that although San Jose is currently building the most shelter beds in all of California, the city’s ideal outcome is for “families to never have to enter shelters”. Therefore, the city government is prioritizing “prevention, data-driven approaches, transparency, and accountability” as core governance principles.
Councilmember Pamela Campos pointed out that preventing homelessness is not just about statistics but also about “avoiding the extension of suffering and instability in people’s lives”. Councilmember Anthony Tordillos also emphasized the importance of allocating limited resources based on reliable data to maximize effectiveness.
The Santa Clara County Supportive Housing Office stressed that through the HPS, over 2,600 families in the county are able to maintain housing each year, and the nation’s first homelessness prevention randomized controlled trial has confirmed the effectiveness of the system.
San Jose has been actively pushing for significant reforms in housing and homelessness issues over the past year. In the latest Point-In-Time Count of homeless populations, San Jose saw the largest reduction in street homelessness in the county and had a shelter rate higher than the state average. The city government has also expedited the housing approval process, expanded temporary shelters and modular housing construction, and advocated for more efficient use of public resources.
The Mahan administration has outlined three main directions – “faster housing construction, better governance, and stronger prevention” – aiming to establish a policy framework that can continuously improve homelessness issues based on administrative efficiency, transparency, accountability, and scientific data. The promotion of this prevention fund and reporting system is an extension of this governance philosophy.
Following the general process of the San Jose City Council, such annual continuation budgets can usually be deliberated and resolved in the same-day meeting unless additional analysis is requested by council members or there are community opinions to be addressed. Our reporter has reached out to the mayor’s office and confirmed that the measure has been unanimously approved.
The Homelessness Prevention System (HPS) is a collaborative support program between Santa Clara County and local governments, assisting families in crisis to maintain housing and avoid homelessness through short-term financial aid and case management. ◇