Today, the Mayor of Los Angeles Eric Garcetti was exposed by the City Controller as a FRAUD and a LIAR! Let the record show, the “answer” to Garcetti’s recall, never fully served on the committee, IS A FRAUD AND A LIE! #recallgarcetti

(Source: Scathing new audit finds deep operational failures at L.A.’s top homeless outreach agency)

ICYMI: The Los Angeles Times: Even if California spends millions more on homelessness, here’s why few will notice

Photo Credit: Alex Datig

By BENJAMIN ORESKES, MAY 24, 2019

'...Some state-funded projects and programs have been slow to show results by the standards of a frustrated public. And housing in California has become so expensive that it has been hard to feel the impact of the spending because, in many places, people are falling into homelessness as fast as people on the streets can be housed.

In Los Angeles, a recent county report found that 27,000 homeless people had been placed into permanent housing in 18 months. But a renter needs to make $47.52 per hour, which is more than triple the minimum wage, to pay the median monthly rent of $2,471, according to another report by the California Housing Partnership.

In Alameda County, where Newsom launched his task force, the most recent point-in-time count revealed a 43% jump in homelessness since 2017. EveryOne Home, the organization that conducted the count, says that every year, about 1,500 people enter permanent housing in the county, while nearly 3,000 people also become homeless for the first time.

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The Los Angeles Times: $339,000 for a restroom? L.A. politicians balk at the cost of toilets for homeless people

Photo Credit: Alex Datig

By EMILY ALPERT REYES, JUN 10, 2019

It seems like an obvious fix to the squalor and stench as homelessness surges on Los Angeles streets: more restrooms.

But L.A. has estimated that staffing and operating a mobile bathroom can cost more than $300,000 annually — a price tag that has galled some politicians. During budget talks this spring, city officials estimated that providing toilets and showers for every homeless encampment in need would cost more than $57 million a year.

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The Los Angeles Times: 16,000 people in L.A. now live in cars, vans and RVs. But safe parking remains elusive

Photo Credit: Alex Datig

By SONJA SHARP, JUN 10, 2019

Two years ago, Los Angeles began testing an alternative to homeless shelters called safe parking, giving people living in their cars a secure spot to sleep at night.

The first site was quickly deemed a success, so the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority agreed to fund nine more lots in the pilot program, with promises to expand.

Earlier this year, before the release of new data showing more than 16,500 people living in their vehicles, the authority put out a request to providers across the county to help them make good on that promise.

But the details of the request left some groups frustrated, saying the rules were too burdensome and the budget too tight.

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The Los Angeles Times: Steve Lopez: Welcome to Garcetti’s L.A.: heaps of trash, hordes of rats and very little leadership

Photo Credit: Alex Datig

By STEVE LOPEZ, JUN 08, 2019

Whewww, what a week.

I could give you a hundred breakdowns of what happened and what it all means, but it comes down to this:

We’re in troubled waters on a ship without a captain, and though there might be a few pretenders on the bridge, nobody trusts them.

We found out on Tuesday that although the city and county spent $600 million last year to chip away at the number of homeless people, the total increased by 16% to nearly 60,000.

That same day, voters said absolutely, positively no way to a parcel tax that would have raised money for struggling L.A. Unified schools, and the vote reflected a resounding lack of faith in school administrators to spend the money wisely. A shame, in my opinion. Whatever the sins of the past, shorting 600,000 mostly poor kids at a time when poverty has spilled onto our streets is not the smartest plan.

But this comes back to the leadership problem. Judging by my reader responses, it did not help that one of the parcel tax advocates was L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti. That would be the guy who has presided over the astounding spread of homeless encampments and trash-strewn streets after persuading voters to reverse the trends by taxing themselves.

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The Los Angeles Times: Letters to the Editor: Why you — yes, you — are partly to blame for homelessness

Photo Credit: Alex Datig

Margaret Martin, Los Angeles

To the editor: This is a grave humanitarian crisis. To protect the health of all our citizens, we must take quick action. The Federal Emergency Management Agency should participate. This is what must be done:

• Declare homelessness in Los Angeles an emergency of the highest order, thereby making additional state and federal funds available.
• Designate overnight parking places where people living in vehicles can park without being harassed.
• Obtain and distribute tents, cots and blankets citywide.
• Set up and maintain public toilets, hand-washing facilities and garbage cans citywide that any citizen can access. Keep them secure.
• Transform out-of-service buses into mobile showers and laundries with regular routes, to enable homeless citizens to get their bodies and their clothing clean.
• Partner with local schools of medicine and social work to develop and deploy mobile clinics and counseling centers.
• Partner with local food banks and restaurants to provide homeless citizens with greater access to wholesome food on a daily basis, since they have no access to refrigeration or safe food storage.
• Mobilize additional street-cleaning crews.
• If we fail to take these basic actions, we should expect more disease outbreaks, violence and preventable deaths.

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NBC4 L.A. Streets Of Shame Series: LA Mayor Blames Businesses, Not Homeless, For Rat-Infested Trash on Streets, Says He Owns Homeless Problem

The Los Angeles Times: L.A. is swamped with 311 complaints over homeless camps. But are the cleanups pointless?

Photo Credit: Alex Datig

By EMILY ALPERT REYES, BENJAMIN ORESKES and DOUG SMITH
JUN 07, 2019

...Los Angeles has been deluged with requests to clean up homeless encampments in recent years. Between 2016 and 2018, such requests shot up 167%, according to a Times analysis of 311 data. The trend has continued this year, with requests up 37% in the first few months compared with the same period a year earlier.

The surge in cleanup requests has happened as L.A. and other cities have seen hefty increases in the number of people without permanent shelter. The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority announced Tuesday that the homeless population had jumped by 16% in the city and 12% across the county. Most — 75% — were living outdoors, including in vehicles.

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The Los Angeles Times: Homelessness jumps 12% in L.A. County and 16% in the city; officials ‘stunned’

By Benjamin Oreskes and Doug Smith

Jun 04, 2019

In a hard reality check for Los Angeles County’s multibillion-dollar hope of ending homelessness, officials reported Tuesday that the number of people living on the streets, in vehicles and in shelters increased by about 12% over last year.

The annual point-in-time count, delivered to the Board of Supervisors, put the number of homeless people just shy of 59,000 countywide. Within the city of Los Angeles, the number soared to more than 36,000, a 16% increase.

And as in past years, most — about 75% — were living outside, fueling speculation of a growing public health crisis of rats and trash near homeless encampments downtown.

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