California’s legislature is debating a bill to force community colleges and state universities to set aside parking spaces with bathroom access on campus so homeless students can sleep in their cars.

This is the latest sign that the Golden State’s homelessness problem is out of control. The bill, introduced by Democratic assemblyman Corey Jackson, would mandate community colleges set aside 50 parking spaces with bathroom and shower facilities and develop a safety plan with reporting requirements, including on referrals of students to housing or hotel vouchers.  

“This bill confronts a harsh reality to many of our students who are sleeping in their vehicles or other displaced settings as they are unable to find affordable housing, and that’s jeopardizing their education,” Mr. Jackson said.

A Democratic strategist, Hank Sheinkopf disagrees. “We should be building homes for people, helping them get homes rather than institutionalizing homelessness, which is what this does,” he tells The New York Sun. “It says the American Dream doesn’t really exist. You can stay homeless and live in your car and we’ll give you a crappy education on top of it.”

Nearly 3 in 5 community college students in California are “housing insecure,” according to a survey conducted by the Community College League of California. A 2023 report from the National Center for Education Statistics at the Department of Education found that 8 percent of undergraduates nationally and 5 percent of graduate students are homeless.

California has struggled with twin homelessness and drug crisis for the last five years. The state is home to nearly 190,000 homeless persons — or roughly a quarter of all homeless people in the country. San Francisco’s Mayor London Breed lost reelection last year to a moderate Democrat, Daniel Lurie, in large part over her failure to address homelessness and the fentanyl crisis.

Since the Supreme Court’s Grants Pass v. Johnson decision last summer, which granted local officials power to outlaw public camping and clear homeless encampments — even when a city doesn’t have enough shelter beds available to house all its homeless population — California cities have struggled with how to tackle the crisis.

The Democratic mayor of San Jose, Matt Mahan, is calling for arresting homeless persons if they refuse shelter three times. A recent Politico/UC Berkeley Citrin Center survey found that 37 percent of voters support arresting homeless people if they refuse shelter. Another 24 percent of voters agreed “somewhat” with that proposal, while 38 percent opposed the idea.

A southern California mayor, R. Rex Parris, controversially said at a Lancaster city council meeting earlier this month that he wanted to give the homeless “all the fentanyl they want.” He got a lot of pushback, but the comments illustrate the frustration about which residents feel the government is turning a blind eye.

Governor Newsom supports clearing homeless encampments and made a show of clearing one in front of cameras last summer after the Grants Pass decision. He also recently hosted Ezra Klein on his podcast to talk about the “abundance agenda.” In the podcast, Mr. Newsom criticized onerous regulations that stymie home building and other infrastructure projects.

Yet forcing colleges to create de facto homeless encampments in parking lots seems like a step backward. “Letting students live in parking lots isn’t a solution,”  a California Assembly Republican Caucus leader, James Gallagher, posted to X. “It’s proof their policies have completely collapsed.”

Taking a course at a community college costs roughly $46 per credit, or $138 per course. Several of these colleges offer free tuition to qualifying students. Critics of the bill say that what is likely to happen is that people register for a course to access the parking spots and bathrooms. Colleges will be required to report on housing referrals to these students, so this could end up a cheap and easy way to secure temporary housing.

“It’s a progressive failure,” Mr. Sheinkopf says. “It makes sure other people won’t be going to community colleges because, who wants to hang out with homeless people?”