“I think the better approach to homelessness is what I term more of an empowerment strategy as opposed to an enablement strategy. The Democrats have carried out an enablement strategy,” said District 3 State Assemblyman James Gallagher.

CALIFORNIA REGION (MPG) - According to a 2023 report to Congress by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development there were 181,399 homeless individuals in California.

For State Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher, that is a problem that requires a solution at the legislative level. He recently told the Territorial Dispatch that the State of California’s approach so far to homelessness piecemeal and expensive, and enabling rather than empowering.

Sometimes it’s good to find a political middle ground, especially before diving into a divisive topic such as homelessness, during a newspaper interview. That common ground was independent league baseball, namely the Marysville Drakes, who play in the Pecos League.

Gallagher said, “It’s good to have baseball in Marysville. I certainly support all the teams that have been through…There’s a lot of history connected to it.”

Part of that history has to do with the team’s infield grass and seating which has its roots in the early 20th century.

“The thing that’s cool about that is that it’s the site of Bryant Field,” he continued. “Bryant Field is a historic stadium in Marysville and everybody used to come out, and my dad was actually a batboy for the Marysville Giants, and my grandfather played for many years in that semi-pro league for the Yuba City Bears and the Marysville Giants.”

Both teams played at Bryant Field, with its brickwork trim, at the corner of 14th and B streets.

Today, the ballpark provides little protection from the elements if one were looking for shelter, one of the chief concerns of California’s homeless population.

“I think the better approach to homelessness is what I term more of an empowerment strategy as opposed to an enablement strategy. The Democrats have carried out an enablement strategy,” Gallagher said.

Gallagher described what he considered enablement strategies somewhat satirically: “These are people who just have fallen on hard times and the best way to help them is just to meet them where they’re at, give them all kinds of things including syringes and let them stay in public parks, and let them stay in front of businesses, and essentially cater to them and then build really expensive housing like they did in L.A.’s case. According to their own audit, $760,000 a unit they spent to house one homeless person.”

“Those (strategies) aren’t working. And, in fact, it’s just really enabling the problem,” Gallagher continued. “We want to empower people out of it and I think the best way to do that is to one, you say, hey, you cannot stay in certain places. You can’t be in public parks and in front of businesses.”

Gallagher didn’t mention what the other side of the aisle was doing without providing a solution himself.

“My proposal: regional sheltering facilities that have services built into them — drug treatment, mental health. These don’t have to be expensive apartments. They can be pallet shelters like some jurisdictions have used, essentially like Tuff Sheds with insulation,” he said. “They’re clean. It’s a place you can stay. You have shelter and then also with those places, you have the ability to get help with whatever it is you might need — mental health, drug treatment, getting you on a better path — and then you can move into a place like transitional housing. But all toward empowering that person off the street, getting treatment for what they really need that has caused their homelessness and getting them into, ultimately into permanent housing.”

One might hope as permanent as Bryant Field.

Assemblyman Gallagher represents District 03 for the California State Assembly. He serves Butte, Glenn, Placer, Sutter, Tehama and Yuba counties.