A proposed budget analysis by the Los Angeles Housing Authority estimates that ending homelessness over 10 years would cost $20.4 billion and require local, state and federal government spending to more than double.
The funding would build 36,000 permanent housing units for homeless residents with chronic health issues and build or subsidize an additional 25,000 apartments for extremely low-income residents. The proposal envisions the city maintaining about 17,000 beds in shelters and other temporary housing through 2029, then gradually reducing them thereafter.
If implemented, the analysis projects that homelessness would decrease each year and reach “functional zero” by the end of 2032 — meaning homelessness is rare and short-lived, and a shelter bed would be available to anyone who needs it. The city and private missions and other providers would maintain 6,000 beds, according to the analysis.
According to the latest statistics, there are approximately 45,000 homeless people in the city of Los Angeles, 29,000 of whom are unhoused. Point-in-time count of the homeless population.
Housing Commissioner Anne Sewill said there is no timetable for a formal release of the analysis. The Times obtained the draft report, prepared in January through a public records request. The draft is a comprehensive presentation of spending needs. It outlines funding from city, county, state and federal governments, projects how many new housing units would be built and estimates the sheltered and unsheltered homeless populations on an annual basis.
“The objective was to provide a thorough, detailed, data-driven analysis of housing resources, needs and shortages to determine what combination of investments could address the shortages over a 10-year period,” Sewill wrote in notes on a draft presentation of the proposal.
While not final, the document offers a glimpse into the scale of Los Angeles' homelessness problem and the massive financial help city officials believe is needed to solve it. The proposal projects spending $7.9 billion on homelessness over the next decade using existing funding sources, leaving a $12.5 billion shortfall.
Homelessness continues to be the top concern cited by Angelenos in public opinion polls, and Mayor Karen Bass has dedicated much of her early term to the issue, most notably through an encampment removal and shelter program called “Inside Safe.”
With the region set to host the World Cup in 2026 and the Olympics two years later, mayors and local leaders will face even more pressure to tackle homelessness. Mayor Bass said he differs from previous host city leaders in that: She has no intention of kicking homeless people out of Los Angeles. ahead of the Olympics.
Zachary Seidl, a spokesman for Bass, declined to answer a series of questions from The Times, citing the proposal as a draft.
“Since taking office, the mayor has challenged the status quo, urgently getting people into homes while preventing them from becoming homeless in the first place and building more housing so people can live permanently,” Seidl said in a statement.
This new approach contrasts with the city's larger homelessness strategy in 2016, when the city worked with community groups to back Proposition HHH, a $1.2 billion bond issue to build 10,000 supportive housing units. That goal fell far short of the number of housing units needed to house a homeless population that was then much smaller than it is today.
The analysis was more than three years in the making, beginning with a request from then-Councillor Mark Ridley-Thomas, who was chair of the council's Housing and Homelessness Committee. Last year, as the report stalled, current chair Councillor Nithya Raman said: Her own calling For analysis.
In an interview, Raman said there needs to be an effort to prioritize city spending on successful programs, rather than simply jumping on available funding. Federal COVID-19 relief funds And money Motel conversion from stateThe proposal could help elected officials at all levels of government make strategic decisions, she said.
“We've invested a lot in shelters and housing,” Raman said, “and those investments have often been made in a very piecemeal way.”
Raman said she is waiting for the final version to examine its premise in detail, but she understands any proposal will have costs. Data from the transitional housing program suggests there may be opportunities to reduce costs, she said. Temporary housing subsidy It's helping more people get out of homelessness than initially thought, and the program's success could alleviate some of the projected need for more expensive permanent supportive housing construction, she said.
Even if the city can't raise the funds needed to end homelessness, she said, the city has already shown it can make a difference with focused investment. Raman praised Bass' Inside Safe and related efforts. The city's unsheltered population has fallen by 10% this year..
“Homelessness has been around in Los Angeles for a very long time,” she said, “Net zero is the goal, but I think any work we do to steadily move toward that goal will translate into great improvements for the residents of Los Angeles.”
The draft analysis does not propose any new programs to address homelessness, but rather assumes the city will expand existing efforts, such as Inside Safe and the construction of permanent supportive housing. The analysis includes thousands of units of temporary and permanent housing the city promised in a settlement with the Los Angeles League for Human Rights, a group of business owners and residents who say the city and county have failed in their obligations to address homelessness. It also includes about 3,450 psychiatric beds the county agreed to open under the settlement.
Even maintaining existing homelessness spending may be difficult, as local and state budgets that were flush with revenue during the COVID-19 pandemic are now in the red.
Nearly one-third of the funding shortfall is money the city needs from the federal government, which would come primarily through additional vouchers to pay for operating subsidies for supportive housing. The increase in federal aid is one of the most uncertain parts of the proposal, as it will depend in large part on the outcome of November's presidential election. Vice President Kamala Harris' housing plan: Expanding funding for low-income housingis more friendly to the city than former President Trump's.
The city's share of the spending deficit under the proposal would be $2.8 billion, which it would cover by putting citywide or countywide voters before them in 2026.
LA County and the state also need to provide more funding.
The proposition assumes that the county will continue to pay for social services to homeless residents through a 25-cent sales tax increase approved by voters in 2017. That tax is set to expire in 2027. Homeless advocacy groups have called Measure A an ineffective way. A permanent half-cent sales tax increaseA measure to supplement and expand that budget is on the November ballot, and if approved, the additional funds would cover the county's $1.6 billion portion of the overall shortfall identified in the proposal.
Meanwhile, the state would need to increase its budget by $3.5 billion, primarily to cover capital costs for very low-income and supportive housing.
In notes for the presentation, Sewill said a detailed homelessness funding plan would help local leaders make the case for funding when lobbying federal and state officials.
“We must do more, but we cannot do it alone,” Sewill wrote.
Miguel Santana, president and CEO of the California Community Foundation and one of the leaders of the effort, said public officials and city leaders are working on a similar analysis to estimate the costs and programs needed to end homelessness across Los Angeles County.
According to the latest count, about 75,000 people are homeless on any given night in Los Angeles County, with 60% of them in the city.
Santana said the countywide proposal will consolidate the city's eventual efforts, and its goal is to provide the public with a roadmap for solving homelessness within 10 years.
“What's missing in all of this is an endgame,” Santana said.
Times reporter David Zarnizer contributed to this report.
