LOS ANGELES (CNS) – After years of multi-governmental efforts and hundreds of millions of dollars spent to address homelessness in the L.A. region, the latest numbers on the continuing crisis will be revealed Friday as officials announce results of the 2024 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count.
The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, a joint powers agency of the city and county of Los Angeles, will reveal the data during a morning news conference at LAHSA headquarters, following the Jan. 24-26 point-in-time survey conducted by hundreds of volunteers all across the region.
LAHSA CEO Va Lecia Adams Kellum, L.A. County Board of Supervisors Chair Lindsey Horvath and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass will provide remarks about the results. LAHSA Deputy Chief Paul Rubenstein and Benjamin Henwood, a professor with USC’s Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work, will also provide analysis.
Results of the 2023 homeless count showed there were 75,518 people experiencing homelessness in the county, and 46,260 in the city of Los Angeles. Those numbers represented increases from the 2022 count, which showed 69,144 homeless people in the county and 41,980 in the city.
Those 2023 figures also represented a continued climb in the number of Southland homeless people over the past five years. In 2018, there were 52,765 homeless counted in the county, and 31,285 in the city.
L.A. County Supervisor Janice Hahn, at the time, called the 2023 results “disappointing.”
“It is frustrating to have more people fall into homelessness even as we are investing hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars and resources into efforts to bring people inside,” Hahn said.
“I appreciate the cities that have stepped up and supported solutions, but these numbers prove that solutions-oriented cities are too few and far between.”
L.A. county and city officials have committed to a collaborative approach to reducing homelessness and bringing unhoused individuals into temporary and permanent housing, such as shelter sites, motels, apartments, among other sites.
In December 2022, Bass launched her Inside Safe initiative in an effort to reduce tents and other encampments across city streets and bring unhoused individuals into temporary housing. Bass and the L.A. City Council have also implemented programs aimed at bolstering housing production, increasing shelter beds and sustaining tiny home villages, interim housing sites and other housing facilities with the intent of placing unhoused individuals into permanent housing.
County officials launched a similar program to that of Inside Safe, known as Pathway Home, in 2023.
Recent Comments