To the editor: Each the town and county of Los Angeles are contemplating breaking up the L.A. Homeless Services Authority. Quite a few stories criticize LAHSA for funding discrepancies and poor accountability. These are vital critiques that warrant quick intervention.
However an important difficulty is homelessness prevention, which isn’t being addressed adequately. LAHSA can not presumably cut back the variety of homeless individuals on the streets, in automobiles and in RVs if the quantity retains going up.
In keeping with LAHSA, the variety of individuals experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles County declined by 0.27% in 2024 in comparison with 2023. That slight lower measured by a three-day snapshot in time is negligible contemplating that extra individuals are turning into homeless than are being housed. Nationally, for each 100 individuals who exited homelessness in 2024, another 118 entered into homelessness, in accordance with the federal authorities.
So the town and county have to look extra carefully on the causes homelessness is just not being prevented: the staggeringly excessive value of rental housing, the shortage of extraordinarily low-income housing, the elimination of rent-controlled models and the dearth of sources to help those that are weak to falling into homelessness due to eviction.
Jane Demian, Los Angeles
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To the editor: Studying your editorial on New Yr’s Day about LAHSA and all its sources bought me fascinated about an aged lady I’ve seen camped out for the previous couple of years on a bus bench along with her belongings scattered round her on Santa Monica Boulevard in Century Metropolis, throughout from gleaming skyscraper buildings.
That this lady has not been sheltered is each a tragedy and a scandal for this metropolis.
Doug Weiskopf, Burbank
