Newsom on the News, MRod: “a noose”
At the beginning of August, Governor Gavin Newsom materialized under I-5 to help Caltrans abate an unremarkable pile of litter. Taking the “sweep” assignment literally, he was filmed flourishing an actual broom before tossing it atop a modest trash heap, where it landed next to a sun-faded American flag throw pillow. Later, he’d grandstand to a FOX News reporter and espouse:
“I’m not the Mayor of California.”
—CA Governor Gavin Newsom
Notably, there were no unhoused people around to illustrate his points or respond, making the Governor’s words ring hollow in the empty, concrete cavern. If he was trying to prove that encampments are indeed proliferating, it would have been useful for him to show the news some actual homeless people as proof. But all he could point to as evidence that he wasn’t just ranting and raving about nothing was his medium mound of garbage.
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“This is an indictment of Counties.”
GavinNewsom was adamant that this specific trash proved a point: local leaders are incompetent, or at least irresponsible with State grants. In April, the State auditor couldn’t determine if $24B spent on homelessness under Newsom’s supervision was wasted. Maybe it would have been more effective if the cash was simply thrown into Caltrans’ gigantic garbage compactors, like the important possessions of unhoused people all too often are during Caltrans’ “clean-up” operations.
A long-standing member of City Council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee (and Homelessness and Poverty Committee under prior Mayor Eric Garcetti), CD7 Councilwoman Monica “MRod” Rodriguez, during an HnH meeting less than a year ago, unflinchingly compared funding long-term subsidies to “a noose”, meaning funding them would be setting the City up for failure, since it would have to come up with the money every year to prevent displacement.
During this week’s Housing and Homelessness Committee meeting, MRod made reference to
“a gun to our head, with all these obligations that we’re trying to meet”
— CD7 Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez
when discussing whether to pay outstanding balances due to nonprofit motel operators without first verifying service delivery. She went on to threaten “receivership”, referring to the fall of the Skid Row Housing Trust (colloquially called “The Trust” to differentiate it from Skid Row Housing, which is another nonprofit housing operator downtown) at the expense of the City. Once encompassing one-third of the City’s Single-Room Occupancy “SRO” stock, the last 1,000+ units that remained of The Trust was purchased by developer Leo Pustilnikov at an unbelievable price of only $8k/unit, according to Liam Dillon’s reporting of the sale in LA Times.
At Friday’s City Council meeting (agenda), item #5 (CF24-1041/CF23-0600-S43/CF22-1042) diverted $8.36M specifically designated for:
“Other Homeless Services-Interim Homeless Housing”.
These funds were directed to LAPD for 88,353 overtime hours at rate of $94.62/hour. A table attached in the agenda spells out a system wherein each of the 15 Council Districts are allotted between 0 and 4,000 LAPD OT hours on top of a base amount of 4,090 OT hours per district. The variable amount is based on the number of A Bridge Home “ABH” congregate shelters in that particular district, with a total of 27 ABH in the City.
LAPD stood by, hands on guns on hips, as council unanimously approved this item, which was actually just a quarterly report about the expenditures. The directing of funds for this purpose was initially passed as a budget recommendation, with Hugo Soto-Martinez and Eunisses Hernandez dissenting. Why doesn’t Monica Rodriguez see increases to LAPD’s massive budget as threatening as the firearms she compares outstanding invoices to?
MRod raised some valid issues about the San Fernando Valley getting fewer Inside Safe operations compared to the rest of the City, and the map below, which highlights Inside Safe Operation #22 at Paxton/Bradley may illustrate her point:
Paxton Street
There’s no denying the existence of a fairly large unhoused population that dwells in tents and makeshift shelters, but primarily in “oversized” vehicles on Pacoima’s Paxton Street, which runs parallel to Fwy 118 and interchanges with I-5 to the west, running into Fwy 210 to the east. Paxton’s intersections on Glenoaks Blvd and Bradley Ave have typically been places where unsheltered people post up in permanently parked vehicles, much to the annoyance some of CD7 MRod’s vocal housed constituents:
Pacoima’s unhoused people, their vehicle dwellings and “encampments” are prolific in their ability to generate news segments and headlines like:
* 7/12/24 Homeless family of autistic boy slapped in Pacoima uplifted by community | KTLA5
* 2/28/2024 Pacoima Homeless Encampment Brings Three-Way Conflict Business Owner Clashes with Councilmember Rodriguez and RV Occupants | San Fernando Valley Sun
* 3/27/2022 Pacoima Residents Plead with City to Cleanup Homeless encampment | NBCLA
* 6/23/2021 Homeless Pacoima Man Creates a Decorative Encampment Makeshift home next to 118 Freeway could be removed under Caltrans’ “clean up” procedures | San Fernando Valley Sun
Just a few years ago, neighbors and media took a warm liking to a lovable little landscaper and gardener who made a whimsical shelter-sculpture up on the embankment of Fwy-118 at Glenoaks Ave. Jose Fuentes was said to be 64 years old at the time FOX11 took notice of the structure, which he claimed to have inherited from a man who passed away. He gradually added: a green toy slide, a boogeyboard, American flags, retaining walls, a white picket fence, and more. He and his artistic assemblage had an advocate in neighbor Nathaniel Padilla, owner at Tacos el Canelo:
“People love it.
I have people climbing up the mountain to go give him gifts like he’s – like he’s baby Jesus, almost.
I have many people that come out and ask me questions about: ‘What’s going on? What is this? Is this, like, a memorial?’
No, it’s not. It’s just a creative man at work.”
—Nathaniel Padilla, owner at Tacos el CanelotoFOX11
Point-in-time
Pulling from LAHSA & USC’s annual point-in-time “PIT” homelessness count “HC”data going back to 2017, the three census tracts around Paxton Street (#1042, 1043, & 1044) had over 50 adults ages 24+ living outdoors “on any given night” in 2023, by far the most since 2017. But by the beginning of this year, it was back down to less than 20:
Volunteers counted nearly 80 RVs in 2022, plus around 50 “makeshift shelters” (tarps, shopping carts, umbrellas and pallet assemblages that are not tents or vehicles) for a total of over 150 dwellings belonging to unhoused people. By the most recent HC, which was conducted in January, that number had returned to the 2020 level of around 80, but with a higher proportion of RVs than tents:
CA-based nonprofit firm Applied Survey Research (ASR) did Long Beach’s 2003 and LA’s 2005 and 2007 PIT Homeless Counts “HC”, using a different method of calculating, but arriving at a similar figure of almost 60 unhoused adults across the three census tracts in 2007, so it can be said with reasonable certainty that least a dozen people have been living at Paxton Street along Fwy-118 on a fairly permanent basis for the past 20 years or more, with a sudden increase in tents, and then oversized vehicles corresponding to the progression of the pandemic.
It would appear that something worked to bring 2024’s counts of dwellings and adults back down to roughly one-third and one-half of 2023’s all-time-highs, respectively.
Are pilot programs performing?
MRod claims to have pioneered techniques like “Paxton pilot project”, criminal former-County Supervisor/State Assemblymember/CD10 Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas’ LAMC § 41.18 Standard Operating Procedure “SOP”, “Street Engagement Strategy”, Encampment to Home/“Street to Home” and “RV to Home” pilots on and around Paxton Street. She even wrote a letter to LA Alliance for Human Rights Judge David O. Carteron March 13th about the perceived successes of these multiple pilot programs.
Paxton encampments were additionally studied from January to June 2023 as one of the focuses of a report by abt Associates,which was funded by the Conrad Hilton Foundation. In 2021, LAFH published a report about the Paxton/Bradley Project Roomkey intervention for City Council’s HnP Committee:
OUTCOMES
Totally cleared area was fenced off and remains clear today (1 yr later)
61 people engaged with LAFH
* 25 moved into permanent or safe housing
* 22 Still engaged in IH and successfully transitioned from Airtel [Roomkey]
• 14 working on RRH plan
• 8 matched to PSH
Other: 2 deceased, 1 incarcerated, and 11 disengaged
So, while Paxton Street had been the focus of around half-a-dozen or more pilot programs since 2019, none of them – besides Project Roomkey – appears to have actually moved people indoors and then stayed accountable to them. Inside Safe remains unique in that it seems to have taken seriously the commitment to not further displace around 50 people originally from Paxton St. for over one year...
State homelessness programs like CA Department of Social Services “CDSS”-funded Roomkey, Housing and Community Development “HCD”-funded Homekey and Business, Consumer Services and Housing “BCSH”-funded Encampment Resolution Fund “ERF” Grants, all struggled to retain participants due to limited shelter durations and lack of connections to longer-term subsidies.
If even the CA Auditor can’t be sure the State isn’t the problem, all of the Governor’s finger-pointing might be a distraction. The State can’t prove anything good or bad without access to data held by the City and County. But there’s nothing stopping any member of the public from doing their own performance audits using the information obtainable by records requests and reports such as the Statewide Homelessness Assessment (FY18-19, FY19-20, and FY 20-21, released in 2023). And the available information doesn’t show that State spending has directly resulted in many placements into housing or shelter, much less permanent placements that were retained.
Community Audit
Several groups of unhoused people and their advocates, including Valley (CD6)-based Aetna Street Solidarity and Westside’s Fairfax Mutual Aid, Mar Vista Voice and Palms Unhoused Mutual Aid, in additon to South Bay Mutual Aid & Care Club, Food for Comrades and LA Street Care, did a community-led performance audit of Inside Safe, which they released at the beginning of July. If communities of advocates and unhoused people are managing to gather enough data to perform their own audits, it’s hard to believe the state can’t do the same.
State demands “results”
When Newsom pressed local leadership about a perceived lack of “results” generated by $144,090,602.15 in recent grants made to LA from the State’s Encampment Resolution Fund “ERF”, it was quite ironic considering his own struggle proving success or even confirming failure of location-based homelessness initiatives. After his long day of frolicking amongst orphaned bicycle parts on Paxton Street and Remick Avenue, the Governor vowed to stop funding Cities and Counties that do not produce the “results” he wants to see.
Perhaps the Governor chose to provoke Pacoima because he’s considering whether or not to approve several pending applications for more State Encampment Resolution Fund “ERF” grants, including from CD7.
Governor Newsom has never been able to prove ERF or his other favorite programs Homelessness Housing, Assistance, and Prevention Program “HHAP”, CalWorks, etc. produce “results”, either. The April attempt by the State Auditor to evaluate five grant programs, all overseen byCal ICH(the State’s Inter-agency Council on Homelessness) couldn’t be completed because there wasn’t enough data about outcomes to audit. The inconclusive report could not determine if ERF spending is an effective way to address homelessness. It recommends tracking spending and outcomes going forward:
“April 9, 2024
* Cal ICH Has Not Consistently Tracked and Evaluated the State's Efforts to End Homelessness.
* Two of the Five State-Funded Programs We Reviewed Are Likely Cost-Effective, but the State Lacks Clear Outcome Data for the Other Three.”
— 2003.102.1 CA State Auditor Grant Parks
Importantly, it is still unclear what exactly the Governor considers to be acceptable “results” for encampment resolutions. Is he surprised one-time grants aren’t affording sustainable, permanent housing outcomes?
It remains possible that unaccountable spending on homelessness is making things worse.
Perhaps getting defunded by the State would be a blessing in disguise for LA.
Comparing data (when it exists) and outcomes (when they are known) from the State’s operations to the City’s, we see parallel initiatives that could be consolidated. to maximize benefits to participants and better prevent displacement.
Over a year ago, in July 2023, the 22nd Inside Safe operation took place at an encampment in the same general area of CD7 where Gavin Newsom was demanding “results” just last month. We can see that 50 people came inside from this location at the initial event in July, and 7 additional people moved into interim shelter in three repopulation efforts that occurred throughout December.
All but 7 out of 57 Paxton Inside Safe participants have been tracked to an indoor outcome or known outdoor location.
While Newsom was lamenting that local re-housing efforts are ineffective, he may have been implying that they simply push unhoused people into State jurisdictions, such as under freeways, where Caltrans does encampment resolutions. But we can see from the City’s data that only 14 out of 57 people from the Paxton Inside Safe operation (#22) have exited to outcomes other than housing. Of the 14 exits, four of them were incarcerated and one was institutionalized in a medical or psychiatric facility. That means only seven people were unaccounted for at Paxton, and if the people brought in by the three repopulation efforts had actually been displaced from Inside Safe and then allowed back in (as re-entries), it leaves zero.
Roomkey to Inside Safe
Inside Safe is designed to resemble FEMA-funded COVID-19 emergency-era program, Project Roomkey, which wasn’t for permanent housing, although about 20% of participants did secure housing. Roomkey wasn’t a sanitation-led program, but the majority of Inside Safe operations are. The first exception was a targeted effort to absorb “legacy” Project Roomkey guests so they didn’t end up back on the streets.
Inside Safe activation prevented displacement of Roomkey “legacy” guests.
As of March, at least 25% of Inside Safe’s 2,549 participants were referrals or transfers, with many coming from State programs that were set to end, like Roomkey “Legacy”.
About a quarter of Inside Safe participants came from outreach referrals and targeted efforts to transfer participants in/out of Augmented Winter Shelter Program “AWSP” and other interim programs, which are supported partially or entirely by the State. In that way, it’s not fair to compare Roomkey and Inside Safe, because Inside Safe is mitigating displacements that Roomkey’s demobilization would have otherwise caused, while also trying to resolve “encampments” through interim shelter that eventually leads to permanent housing.
While Roomkey did not set out to resolve unsheltered homelessness using permanent housing and ultimately displaced most participants, many of the “legacy” guests absorbed by Inside Safe are the ones that have moved out to Permanent Supportive Housing “PSH” or subsidies. Inside Safe appears committed to retaining participants for longer than Roomkey did so permanent housing outcomes can be realized.
Despite many flaws, the Mayor’s Inside Safe program is producing better results and is more transparent than State programs. Because statuses are tracked, it is possible for even motivated people living on the streets to request data and analyze outcomes for individual operations so as to refute the empty criticisms the Governor made in Pacoima at the beginning of August.
Inside Safe is being funded by the City’s Homeless Emergency Account “HEA”, which was not a grant from FEMA like the ones that funded Roomkey. The HEA was worked into the City’s budget by the Mayor’s Executive Order 2. It was initially resourced with $300M, securing an additional $180M to keep it operating another year. But since then, the City has received reimbursements from the County and incorporated State grants into its operation, making Inside Safe more sustainable.
Encampment to Home
Nonprofits receive generous funds, but motels and unhoused clients are lucky if they get allocated resources as intended.
State-funded motel shelter programs called Encampment to Home, initiated by individual Council district applications for Encampment Resolution Fund (ERF-1, etc.) applications, are supposed to be way less of a spectacle, but that doesn’t mean smooth or successful operations. Despite excessive planning of an ERF-1 operation in CD4, all of the funds for housing were removed from the budget so a nonprofit could increase its capacity:
“The master leasing of housing options is being eliminated thus removing all funds from the sustainable outcomes category.”
—CPRA CD4 communications with the State about CD4’s $1.8M ERF-1 grant
So while it has placed unsheltered people in some of LA’s highest buildings like LA Grand, which recently demobilized for the last time, and purchased historic The Mayfair Hotel, Inside Safe isn’t glamorous, but it is a hot topic. Unless and until it drops the remaining 1,000+ people in its contracted motel rooms like hot potatoes, as all interim programs eventually do displace their “legacy” clients, I challenge anyone who calls the Mayor’s “aircraft experiment” a total failure, and point to the many fatal flaws of the 27 Garcetti relics called “A Bridge Home”…
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