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California's housing department is clawing back $11 million it awarded to Marin County to convert a 70 room hotel to homeless housing after the Marin County Board of Supervisors voted not to pursue the hotel's purchase
Here's a good write-up of the Marin County Board's decision, via @sfchronicle https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Homeless-housing-plan-for-Novato-hotel-under-15718089.php
The clawback is the highest profile setback yet for Newsom's Project Homekey, which has awarded more than $800 million to local governments and housing agencies to buy motels and other properties for homeless housing in the wake of COVID-19
All those dollars have to be spend by the end of the year, per federal guidelines. Waiting to hear back whether that $11 million can be redirected to another Homekey project or another use or will be returned to feds
Marin County approved two other Homekey projects, but fierce opposition from the city of Novato and project neighbors made the county reconsider the purchase.
The county/city split is nothing new for Homekey. The city of Milpitas has threatened legal action to stop a similar motel conversion Santa Clara County wants to pursue.
Newsom has urged local lawmakers to shed a "not in my backyard" mentality in approving these projects.
A controversial Sacramento Homekey project that faced legal challenges has also been shelved, although project proponents say differences over a post-COVID property appraisal doomed the purchase, not lawsuits. https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article247155309.html
