LOS ANGELES – Mayor Karen Bass said Friday the city would foot the bill for an independent audit of her signature Inside Safe initiative to combat homelessness in answer to a Los Angeles federal judge’s questions about the program’s transparency in light of alleged missed deadlines by the city in moving homeless residents out of the city’s largest encampments and under a roof.
Bass, who is currently in France, spoke to U.S. District Judge David Carter by telephone early Friday, agreeing that the court will have final say in choosing an auditor, the judge said during the brief resumption of a hearing dealing with a motion brought by the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights asking for penalties to be brought against the city.
Carter, who indicated Thursday that the city has acted in “bad faith” in meeting its goals, said Bass and City Council President Paul Krekorian would appear in a federal courtroom in downtown Los Angeles on March 18 to work out the details of the focused audit.
The L.A. Alliance, a coalition of downtown business owners and residents, is demanding the city of Los Angeles pay a nearly $6.4 million fine for its alleged lack of transparency and failure to reduce homeless encampments within deadlines set in the April 2022 settlement of the city’s part of the Alliance lawsuit.
The Alliance suggested that the city’s alleged problems in clearing encampments and creating enough shelter beds, particularly for the mentally ill, are the result of issues connected with the Inside Safe program, which allocates $250 million for outreach and motel rentals to clean up encampments. Bass claims the program has housed people in every council district in the city since December 2022.
L.A. City Controller Kenneth Mejia has also expressed concerns about the mayor’s program, telling Carter of what he views as the city’s “lack of transparency and accountability on homelessness efforts despite billions of dollars spent.”
Carter has demanded what he calls “absolute transparency” in the city’s spending and said he wants all invoices going forward to include a summary of where the money was going.
Carter suggested there is too much waste in the millions of dollars put towards the homeless in Los Angeles.
“Our ultimate goal isn’t handing out peanut butter,” he said from the bench. “Our ultimate goal is shelter and housing.”
At the same time, recent filings from the city and county of Los Angeles, which Carter quoted at length as part of the hearing, “demonstrate a resurgence of the quarreling and deadlock surrounding the issues of homelessness,” the judge said, referring to the impasse that stalled momentum in the lawsuit for years.
In March 2020, the L.A. Alliance sued the city and county of Los Angeles to compel elected officials to rapidly address the homelessness crisis, especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. The plaintiffs demanded the immediate creation of shelter and housing to get people off the streets, services and treatment to keep the unhoused in shelter, and regulation of public spaces to make streets, sidewalks and parks safe and clean.
In the eventual settlement, it was agreed that the city would reduce encampments, establish deadlines and goals to document its progress, and return public spaces to their intended uses.
The county’s settlement agreement would create 3,000 treatment beds for unsheltered people with mental illnesses and addictions, subsidize 450 “Board and Care” beds, and establish deadlines and targets to document its efforts.
According to the L.A. Alliance, the settlements will result in 3,500 mental health and treatment beds and 19,700 beds for people experiencing homelessness, including 6,700 beds focused on helping those living near freeways and underpasses.
Although the lawsuit originally appeared to target the Skid Row area specifically, the city and county’s agreements cover all of Los Angeles and are not limited to Skid Row and downtown. The current L.A. Alliance motion singles out downtown’s Skid Row area and two locations in Highland Park as requiring urgent action.
Carter approved the settlements on the condition that he closely oversee the city and county’s progress in meeting their deadlines and goals.
The judge has not ruled on the L.A. Alliance motion recommending that the city pay a nearly $6.4 million fine for its alleged lack of transparency and failure to reduce homeless encampments within deadlines.
The motion alleges that the city is not meeting its goals of housing a minimum of 60% of people living on the streets in each of the city’s 15 council districts.
The L.A. Alliance alleges the city did not live up to its agreement to create a total of 5,190 beds by the end of 2023. The association of downtown business and property owners contends the city has created only 2,810 beds — falling 2,380 short.
In his response, Chief Assistant City Attorney Scott Marcus told the court Thursday that while the city faced a “delay” in complying with part of the settlement, it did not blow any deadlines.
“Yes, it took the city longer than it should have,” Marcus said. “We are sorry.”
Within the last 10 months, 26 homeless encampments have been “resolved” and 1,600 people have been brought inside, he said.
“We are not yet in breach of this agreement,” Marcus said. “The city is fully transparent about what it’s doing. And fully transparent about (saying), `We’re not there yet.”‘
Carter indicated that more monitoring is necessary to make sure the city is complying with the settlement. He also said he is “uncomfortable” with the proposed $6.4 million sanction against the city.
