In spite of ramped up efforts across Los Angeles County to combat homelessness, the number of people living without permanent shelter jumped 12 percent this year.
That’s according to the results of an annual count conducted in January, which the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority announced this morning.
The agency estimates that at the start of the year, 58,936 county residents were experiencing homelessness—up from 52,765 in 2018.
Director Peter Lynn said today that even that total captures only those without housing on a given night. He says that more than 100,000 people were likely unhoused at some point in the year prior.
“It is heartbreaking on a personal level,” says Elise Buik, president of the United Way of Greater Los Angeles, which has been a strong advocate for greater investment in homeless services.
“We are putting more dollars and resources into units [of affordable housing], and my hope is that as they come online, we will start to make a dent in these numbers,” she tells Curbed.
Service providers and local officials are struggling to explain the alarming results of this year’s count, which follows a slight drop in homelessness seen in 2018.
Lynn suggested Tuesday that a booming economy may be leaving behind some of the region’s lowest paid workers.
“If you want to understand homelessness, you have to think about the poorest in our community,” Lynn told reporters. “Minimum wage has moved much more slowly than rents. Those folks are under tremendous pressure.”
In the city of Los Angeles, the increase is even more dramatic—the population grew 16 percent since last year. LAHSA calculates that 36,300 people are now experiencing homelessness within city limits.
Throughout the LA region, roughly 75 percent of those experiencing homelessness—44,215 people—lack shelter and are relegated to sleeping in vehicles, makeshift encampments, and on streets and sidewalks.
Mayor Eric Garcetti said Tuesday that the discouraging results of this year’s count haven’t weakened the resolve of local officials to address the growing crisis.
“We cannot let a set of difficult numbers discourage us, or weaken our resolve,” he said in a statement. “And I know that, if we keep working together, believing in one another, and caring for people in desperate situations, we will end homelessness in this city.”
The spike in homelessness is not unique to Los Angeles. Across Southern California, counts undertaken this year have revealed dramatic increases in the number of people without permanent housing: 22 percent in Riverside County, 23 percent in San Bernardino County, 28 percent in Ventura County, and 43 percent in Orange County.
Lynn said Tuesday that without programs in place at the city and county level, LA’s numbers would have been much worse.
According to LAHSA, nearly 22,000 people were placed into housing through local initiatives last year, a 23 percent increase from a year earlier.
That progress has been outweighed by the number of people now becoming homeless. LAHSA surveys indicate that more than 60 percent of those without housing are experiencing homelessness for the first time.
“For us, if we’re able to house more people and the numbers still go up, there’s a real challenge in housing affordability,” said Lynn.
In 2016, city of Los Angeles voters approved a $1.2 billion bond measure to finance 10,000 units of affordable housing with on-site services for homeless residents with disabling conditions.
The first building funded by the initiative opened less than a week ago—though construction is now underway on 1,347 affordable units funded by the measure.
In early 2017, county voters passed Measure H, a quarter-cent sales tax increase to fund outreach, supportive services, and housing subsidies for residents experiencing homelessness.
Buik says it will take a while for these investments to fully pay off, but that she’s optimistic that the tides may soon turn.
“We didn’t get into this issue overnight and we won’t solve it overnight,” she says.
Comments
No, we’re not building concentration camps in the desert, internment camps by the river, "shipping" anybody anywhere or otherwise denying citizens of their rights to deal with this issue.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 11:39am
Where would you suggest we start, to try to curtail this issue?
By ewilliams1911 on 06.04.19 11:40am
Start? ewilliams1911, don’t be obtuse.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 11:43am
Criticizes everyone else’s solutions but then has none of this own.
By LADude on 06.04.19 12:34pm
Dude, been on this very board for years supporting the city’s efforts. Heck, I’ve even offered some more out-of-the-box ideas like stricter oversight and control over rehab facilities that gladly contract with drug courts across the nation, fail to rehab their patients, and then dump them on our streets. (my recounting of that personal research project was likely the beginning of Renter’sRage/TransplantTrash obsession with out of towner homeless btw!)
No, we aren’t doing enough, but since I live in reality and I know that we’re never gonna just do what I think we should do, I support the incremental steps we’ve taken and hope to convince my fellow Angelenos to do even more.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 1:02pm
What if the city were to buy thousands of RV’s and park them in Lancaster?
By neto111 on 06.04.19 1:20pm
[I’m gonna be patient]
First, we have to disabuse ourselves of the notion that any other municipality is going to gladly take our homeless population. That’s never happening.
Second, District 5 already has their own homeless people.
Third, unless you’re gonna force people (and we aren’t) to live in them I don’t see how spending money (I don’t think that H money can’t be spent this way) this way helps.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 1:36pm
We have lots of homeless, too. Why spend money to attract more? Those other cities are going to be shipping them here.
By caseym54 on 06.04.19 1:41pm
Who said homelessness is caused by high rents?
[Good faith or GTFO]
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 1:46pm
…you changed your comment while I was responding to it I think.
One thing I definitely DO NOT advocate is trying to foist our problems onto other municipalities. No other city wants our city’s homeless.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 2:10pm
Who said to just dump them off in Lancaster? With the millions of dollars wasted trying other things, the city of LA could pay Lancaster rent on the land the RV’s would be on. And I only say Lancaster becasue it has the space to house people and it is close to LA on the chance some of them may work in LA. Also, we would not force anyone to do anything. But if there is somewhere they could go then the city of LA could start to move the homeless of the streets becasue they would not have the excuse of not having anywhere to go. It’s called a choice. BTW what is the city doing right now??? Helping to build few beds for the thousands? It will only take decades if we keep going in incremental steps.
By neto111 on 06.04.19 2:45pm
We’re not forcibly relocating anybody anywhere. Why is this so hard to understand?
neto111, I tried to be patient, but I just can’t do it. No replies please, have a good day.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 3:22pm
Did you not read my comment?? Everyone else can see that I said we would be giving people a CHOICE. Why are you against a possible solution? Do you work as a city consultant?
By neto111 on 06.04.19 3:32pm
Sean hates solutions.
By John Smart on 06.04.19 3:43pm
For what earthy reason do you think "rehab" cures addiction. At best, it’s a Band-Aid to stop the bleeding, but the first thing most addicts do coming out of rehab is to get high. Drug addiction is only cured when the addict really wants to be cured. It cannot be imposed upon them.
By caseym54 on 06.04.19 1:40pm
Exactly. And if rehab facilities were uniformly distributed across the country it wouldn’t be an issue, but they aren’t. My (admittedly cursory) research turned up some evidence that California and Florida had more than their share.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 1:43pm
And why do you think that is? To put someone in rehab means that they are basically kept in a building full of drug addicts. They share a room with drug addicts, they spend all day with drug addicts and they sit together several times a week to discuss their experiences with drugs and their feelings about drugs, etc – so basically for however many months you are stuck in rehab your life still revolves around drugs, but now you just don’t have any. Then they get released back into the world and what do you think is going to happen? Of course they go back to drugs. Its Pavlovian. They’re practically trained into it.
By Cocomonstr on 06.05.19 1:04pm
"Dude, been on this very board for years supporting the city’s efforts" None of which are solutions.
By LADude on 06.04.19 3:39pm
Because I’m an adult living in reality that doesn’t expect the government to just "solve" everything.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 3:42pm
Via immigration. Immigration only helps the rich get richer and poor become homeless
By Stephanie88a99 on 06.04.19 11:52am
time to go back to poor houses and poor farms. arrest all people living on the street and bring them there. able bodied farm and cook and clean and take care of the elderly. i grew up near an old deserted one in san mateo. same people as today – people without family, with mental and physical problems and addicts.
By cicinla on 06.04.19 11:37pm
No one ever suggested concentration camps or internment camps. You are just phrasing feasible solutions that way because you disagree with them. No homeless would ever be FORCED to live somewhere. The only restriction is that the City must have a certain number of available beds in order to enforce vagrancy laws. So the solution is to create as many beds as possible as quickly as possible. If the homeless choose not to live in those beds, they can move to a different city, but they will not sleep on the streets of LA.
By LADude on 06.04.19 12:33pm
Concentration camps have absolutely been suggested as the solution. "Building housing for them out in the desert where land is cheap and just bus them out there." No one could ever answer how you get them on the buses because the only way is to force them.
By CaliSon on 06.04.19 2:11pm
You might want to study up on the meaning of "concentration camp" and the history of them before you start throwing that phrase around so casually. This is an instance in which hyperbole is not strengthening your argument.
By MyrnaMinkoff on 06.04.19 3:07pm
That’s a totally different, and interesting, convo to have. I used the term ‘concentration camp’ specifically to drive home just how dangerous and un-American some of these ‘plans’ are.
By LosFeliz$ean on 06.04.19 3:30pm