Project Homekey Is CA’s Ambitious Plan to House Homeless People. Is it Working?

KQED's Forum

KQED

News, Politics, News Commentary

4.2 • 726 Ratings

🗓️ 12 May 2026

⏱️ 55 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

California launched Project Homekey after the pandemic to quickly create new housing and get homeless people off the streets. Over the last few years the state has spent $3.8 billion converting existing properties such as old hotels and apartment buildings into housing that could be built fast and at a lower cost than ground-up construction. But the program has had mixed results according to a CalMatters investigation that found that about half of the development projects in the program either came in late, went over budget or were never built. We’ll talk about how well Project Homekey is working, and what we can learn from its successes and failures. Guests: Marisa Kendall, homelessness reporter, CalMatters Ryan Finnigan, associate research director focused on homelessness in California, Terner Center for Housing Innovation, UC Berkeley Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Support for a Key QBD podcast comes from Xfinity.
0:03.5	Thanks to the Xfinity five-year price guarantee,
0:06.2	your guaranteed five years of reliable Wi-Fi with our best equipment,
0:10.4	no annual contracts, and no fees.
0:13.0	Plus, get online in minutes with same-day Wi-Fi.
0:16.2	Lock in your price and unlock the possibilities.
0:19.1	Xfinity, imagine that.
0:22.5	Restrictions apply. Select plans only. Support for KQED podcasts comes from RINCE. Imagine a world where you have time,
0:30.1	time to pursue your passions, time to be truly great. It's a world made possible by underwear.
0:37.2	Yes, it's a world with underwear you never have to wash.
0:40.6	Rinse has created a revolutionary technology that gives you what you need in this time-hungry life.
0:46.3	Never wash your underwear again and take back that time for your pursuit of greatness.
0:51.8	Learn more about this technology at Underwear You Never Have to Wash.com. Rinse.
0:57.7	It's time to be great.
1:03.5	Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal. There's been a brutal math to our homelessness
1:09.1	and housing crisis. The per unit cost of building new
1:12.5	housing for people who cannot afford to pay much rent is staggering. Developers have told us that it
1:17.5	costs more than $800,000 a unit in San Francisco, and it's not too much cheaper elsewhere in the
1:23.6	Bay Area. So you want to house 1,000 people? That's $800 million. During the policy
1:29.2	innovation boom of the pandemic, when governments were trying many new things, the Newsom
1:33.8	administration hit on the idea of Homekey, a program that would provide grants to local
1:38.3	jurisdictions to buy pre-existing buildings and convert them into housing. Several billion
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 4 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from KQED, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of KQED and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.