Elizabeth Novak, who owns a hair salon in downtown Sacramento, posted a video on Twitter on Friday describing how she often finds people camping in tents across her front door. 

She told how the vagrancy epidemic gripping the state is affecting long-standing business owners and that her shop has been broken into and she has even been attacked.

Novak, who has run her salon for 15 years, said in her social media message that she often has to clean-up urine, feces and used needles left by rough sleepers on her doorstep.

While the issue in San Francisco and Los Angeles has been well documented, the fact that businesses in Sacramento are also suffering as a result of it lays bare how widespread the crisis has become.

Addressing her concerns directly to Governor Gavin Newsom, she said in a heart-felt pleas for action: 'I want to know what are you going to do for us Californians? I've had a business in downtown Sacramento for 15 years - a successful business. 

'I now have to leave my place of business, I have to close my shop.