Our group of caring, concerned Palm Springs residents and business owners has worked informally to assist and demand accountability from the officials and agencies that work on issues related to homelessness. You may have noticed more visible reminders lately that the issue has not gone away, so we want to let you know what we see happening.
On the local front:
In March 2025, a year after Palm Springs opened its Navigation Center to combine short-term and transitional housing options with access to services, officials praised its successes. Statistics showed its beds were slowly filling up and police were reporting less visible homelessness in Palm Springs. Officials pointed to a county-led survey taken in January and released in May as evidence of a dramatic decrease in the number of unhoused individuals living on city streets since 2023. Well in the Desert, an organization that serves thousands of hot meals to unhoused people using volunteers and donations, disputed the official assurances of progress.
By this past summer, some community members and clients were concerned about the services and management of the Navigation Center not meeting their expectations. Palm Springs Councilmembers Ron deHarte and Grace Garner, both recent mayors, are serving as liaisons to a working group evaluating the performance of Martha’s Village, the contractor that operates the Navigation Center. The crux of the problem seems to be that as the center reached capacity, it was drawing unhoused people to Palm Springs from elsewhere, causing spillover problems especially in its north-side vicinity.
The city has made some belated progress in getting affordable housing projects built, which has been difficult because developers tend to think they don’t pay off enough for the effort involved. A 60-unit complex opened on North Indian Canyon Drive in 2024, and a 71-unit complex, including 25 apartments for people who have experienced homelessness, opened in fall 2025. An 82-unit affordable apartment complex on West San Rafael Drive has received planning commission approval. Whatever you think about the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” signed by President Trump on July 4, it expanded the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit, an incentive for developers to build or renovate affordable housing.
When encampments were more common around the city, we engaged in periodic cleanups, a small commitment to help minimize ill feelings toward the unhoused population. We’re happy to report that Pick It Up Palm Springs is a new group coordinating with the city Public Works Department to pick up bagged litter and debris collected by volunteers. You may have joined them or seen them on Ramon Road near the airport on the morning of Dec. 16.
The bigger picture:
The Trump administration is shifting federal funding away from the Housing First approach that has proven success getting people off the streets and into permanent housing without preconditions. The Department of Housing and Urban Development decided to abruptly cut off money that is supporting long-term housing, often for seniors and the disabled, and instead support transitional housing that requires work and addiction treatment.
Here in California, there has been a big debate over how to help some of our most vulnerable unsheltered people. The Community Assistance, Recovery and Empowerment (CARE) Court program has gotten mixed results since its statewide implementation last year. The nonprofit CalMatters reported in September that CARE Courts were getting far fewer mentally ill homeless people into treatment than expected. A new law in October 2025 expands eligibility for CARE Court to include people who experience psychotic symptoms with bipolar disorder. Eligibility had been mostly limited to people with schizophrenia. Civil liberties advocates had opposed the program for allowing any court-ordered forced treatment, but it turns out that’s rarely happening. The reality is that counties have mostly relied on existing outreach and voluntary programs. Here is a positive story involving “relentless outreach” in Orange County.
Please let us know how you would like to get more involved locally.