TO: HONORABLE MAYOR FROM: Councilmember Campos
AND CITY COUNCIL
SUBJECT: SEE BELOW DATE: December 15, 2025
Approved Date: 12/15/2025
SUBJECT: Actions Related to Grant Agreements for Multiple Emergency Interim Housing Program Sites
RECOMMENDATION
1. Approve the memo from the Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Councilmembers Cohen, Mulcahy, and Casey.
2. Direct the City Manager to prepare an informational memo or, at her discretion, return to the Neighborhood Services and Education Committee (NSE) with the proposed strategy for implementing Recommendation #4 in the memo from the Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Councilmembers Cohen, Mulcahy, and Casey. At appropriate intervals, provide the City Council with best practices and lessons learned from this important collection of information.
3. Incorporate the following additional outcome and performance metrics into the real-time dashboard, along with benchmarks to contextualize all data collected:
a. Breakdown of demographic information;
b. Average and median length of stay;
c. Percentage of individuals or households who successfully exited and remained housed (or sheltered) after 18 months; and
d. State-mandated data regarding number of complaints from occupants, along with resolution or correction.
4. Refer for consideration by the City Council during approval of the March Budget Message a Manager’s Budget Addendum (MBA) providing a sustainable framework for service delivery to respond to and proactively address community concerns, particularly those related to public nuisance, illegal activity, and the consistent enforcement of our designated no-encampment zones in neighborhoods hosting emergency interim housing sites.
BACKGROUND
I appreciate the incredible work of the City Administration in building out the emergency interim housing network. While the work to sustain operations is underway, I am proud of the COUNCIL AGENDA: 12/16/2025
FILE: 25-1316
ITEM: 2.18
HONORABLE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL
December 15, 2025
Subject: Actions Related to Grant Agreements for Multiple Emergency Interim Housing Program Sites
interdepartmental collaboration that has brought us this far in meeting the community’s goal to reduce unsheltered homelessness.
The memo from the Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Councilmembers Cohen, Mulcahy, and Casey focuses substantially on cost reduction and operational optimization within our shelter system. I support the core recommendations to collect key information that will inform future policy decisions regarding the interim shelter network. I particularly appreciate the recommendation to solicit feedback from individuals with lived experience to support continuous improvement of the network, ensure both services and the environment assist in the successful transition of households out of homelessness, and identify paths to sustain financial stability. My recommendations seek to enhance this direction with the inclusion of additional metrics and key benchmarking, which already are being collected by staff, as well as opportunities to learn about the information shared from individuals with lived experience.
The memo from the Mayor, Vice Mayor, and Councilmembers Cohen, Mulcahy, and Casey anticipates network optimizations occurring upon the conclusion of the current build-out phase.
In addition to this crucial work, we should continue to prioritize the commitments we have made to neighborhoods hosting emergency interim housing communities. Based on experience from supporting EIH communities in Council District 2, a robust framework for service delivery to support neighborhoods is essential. I am grateful for the attention and support provided by City staff and site operators in responding to neighborhood concerns. Given the anticipated challenging budget environment, we should invest time to understand how to appropriately resource these programs and continue to provide clear channels of communication, define measurable expectations, and set specific benchmarks for the consistent delivery of these services.
To achieve this goal, I recommend that the City Council consider during the March Budget Message directing the City Manager to prepare an MBA that evaluates a programmatic solution that establishes a unified set of expectations and service delivery metrics across the Housing Department, Beautify SJ, the San José Police Department, and shelter operators. The MBA should quantify the resources needed to sustain existing work and expand it as additional EIHs come online and as new priority areas for no encampment zones are established.