The 2019 Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) numbers were supposed to be delivered by the end of May, but it’s May 30 and we still haven’t heard anything. And that’s because the numbers are going to be high, perhaps upwards of a 20% increase (which represents thousands of newly unhoused Angelenos), and no one knows what to say, because we have no actual leaders.
While unsurprising, it’s evident that our electeds’ plans aren’t working, to the point of farce. Reformist attempts are coming up woefully short in trying to treat the symptom, not the source, of houselessness. With no accountability, HHH units are being built at a snail’s pace while thousands of new people are forced out of their homes. Elected “leaders” and policy “experts” (who just happen to be in the pocket of Big Real Estate) continue to beat the drum of “supply and demand,” insisting that the best way out of this hell hole is to build, baby, build. The only real way to confront or “fix” the housing crisis is with a radical re-investment in widespread social housing.
This group of electeds — a feeble, barely-present mayor and his doddering rogues’ gallery of a city council (aka “the 12 Ayes”), many of whom are under investigation for real estate-driven corruption by the FBI — have failed us for decades. Their billions in subsidies to hotel and other unneeded development projects have directly led to tens of thousands of evictions and displacements, forcing people to live on the street or in their cars leading for many, to prison and/or an early grave. Compounded with other flawed policies and openly corrupt practices, the result is a human rights disaster of historic proportions.
Our compromised elected officials who continue to dig us deeper into our civic tragedy are panicking over how to address their long-building failures and the ensuing PR nightmare on their hands. They’ll blame the “housing crisis” for skyrocketing homelessness, but refuse to name the forces driving this crisis, acting as if rents are just magically rising on their own, or name the solutions (“universal rent control,” “Ellis Act repeal,” and tenant rights). Meanwhile, the Mayor and the 12 Ayes continue to burn vast resources on a “No Build” LA 2028 Olympic plan that includes building stadiums and hotels, and spurring additional real estate speculation driving more displacement, more homelessness, and more criminalization of poverty.
Our electeds don’t actually want to fix the crisis, though. The LA homeless count has been too high their entire political careers, so don’t expect them to change anything meaningful in their approach to the issue. That would mean burning bridges with their controlling developers slush fund donors. Instead, we deserve electeds willing to push for a strong vacancy tax, Ellis act repeal, universal rent control, public housing, Services Not Sweeps, and to cancel this obscene Olympic bid. Anything less, and we’re guaranteeing this human rights disaster will only continue stretching well past 2028.
