California should expand pandemic shelter program, study says. How Project Roomkey succeeded

A pandemic program created to shelter California’s vulnerable homeless population during COVID-19 helped thousands of people stabilize and transition into housing, a new independent study has found.

There’s just one problem: the program was expensive and the federal government is backing out of reimbursing local governments hundreds of millions of dollars for it. The program no longer operates in Sacramento County.

The report also comes at a time when California is grappling with its homelessness strategy and a lack of data to determine what is most cost-effective.

More than 62,000 people received temporary housing under the state’s Project Roomkey, which was launched in April 2020. The program moved medically vulnerable people from the streets and congregant shelters into empty hotel and motel rooms in an effort to isolate them and reduce their risk of contracting COVID-19.

While it was not designed as a rehousing program, about one-third of participants transitioned into permanent or temporary housing after leaving, according to a study commissioned by the California Health Care Foundation and conducted by research firm Abt Global.

Another quarter of people temporarily sheltered under the program moved into other emergency shelters and 15% returned to unsheltered homelessness. Destinations for 18% of participants were unknown after they left, and 4% went to hospitals, substance use treatment facilities or other institutional settings.

Researchers gathered data for the study through surveys and interviews with counties and tribes that accepted Roomkey funding grants, as well as visits to five sites across the state, and final outcome assessments from participants in Los Angeles, Ventura and Tulare Counties.

“Not only did Project Roomkey meet its original goal of saving the lives of people who were experiencing homelessness but the program enhanced how interim housing is designed and operated in some communities across California,” the study concludes.

Researchers noted individual rooms gave participants privacy and allowed them to bring possessions and pets.

“As a result, in some communities, (Roomkey) was able to bring people indoors who had previously been unwilling to use traditional, congregate shelters,” said Nichole Fiore, the study’s lead author.

Among the study’s findings is that people who spent more time in the program were more likely to find their own permanent housing upon leaving and less likely to exit to homelessness. For example, of participants in Los Angeles County who participated in Roomkey for one month or less, 5.7% exited to their own housing. That number jumped to nearly 40% for people who stayed between six months and a year, and 50.7% for people who stayed 18 months or more.

This is likely because Roomkey gave people a chance to stabilize after periods of homelessness through housing, access to treatment and other benefits like rent subsidies and case managers, according to the report.

“Longer lengths of stay in PRK accompanied by consistent, supportive services and available rental subsidies is key to creating a pathway to permanent housing,” the study reads. It recommends exploring how the Roomkey model “can be used to support a pathway to permanent housing for people whose need for intensive support is temporary.”

Local governments ran the program expecting much of it to be reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, but FEMA announced in October it would not cover stays longer than 20 days that began after June 11, 2021 — the day the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention changed its pandemic isolation and quarantine recommendation.

The rule change will cost counties an estimated $300 million. Sacramento County officials say the county is now on the hook for $8.9 million spent under the program, which cost a total of $50.9 million in the county.

The study included a number of policy recommendations, including continuing to leverage hotels, motels and the partnerships created under Roomkey. It also recommends investing in interim housing and service models that allow for longer-term stabilization periods.

“Project Roomkey — which was stood up quickly during a global pandemic — shows how much we can move the needle when Federal, State, and local government agencies, Tribes, and the private sector all come together in support of a common goal,” Scott Murray, a spokesperson for the California Department of Social Services, said in response to the study.

How Roomkey Started

Gov. Gavin Newsom unveiled Project Roomkey in early April 2020, weeks after declaring a state of emergency over COVID-19 and amid heightened fears of its transmission, particularly among vulnerable communities and people living in congregant settings.

In addition to shelter in a private room, participants often received two or three meals per day, COVID-19 testing and personal protective equipment (PPE) Many also had access to services like case management and behavioral and physical health treatment. Participants were not required to undergo any evaluations or treatment in order to stay at the sites.

At its peak, the state had more than 16,000 rooms under contract for Roomkey. It began to ramp down in 2021, though according to the study, a handful of communities were still operating at least one Roomkey site at the end of 2023. The program was billed as a public health response but it also provided contracts for hotels that were struggling with losses from travel cancellations.

While the program was first created to isolate homeless people who were older and medically vulnerable, it expanded as the pandemic wore on. After vaccines became readily available, the program’s goals shifted from isolating people at greater risk from the coronavirus disease to a focus on rehousing and stabilization for the state’s homeless.

Meanwhile, the Newsom administration also began working on a related program, Homekey, which focuses on acquiring and converting hotels, motels and apartments into longer-term homes for people experiencing or at risk of homelessness.

The study comes amid renewed scrutiny over California’s homelessness strategy in the face of a looming budget deficit. A recent state audit found that despite more than $20 billion in spending over the past six years, California’s unsheltered population continues to rise. It also revealed a lack of data collection and sharing across state agencies, which makes it difficult to determine which programs are cost-effective.

Researchers with Abt Global also had challenges collecting data for their evaluation of Project Roomkey and recommended better data sharing across state agencies.

“To further understand the homelessness crisis across the state and evaluate what is working well, we need to understand how people are interacting with the many public systems, programs, and benefits; which combination of programs and benefits are best at preventing and resolving homelessness; and who is most at risk for homelessness,” the study’s recommendation reads.