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MONDAY, JULY 07-JULY 13, 2025
RAND study: Homelessness drops in 3 parts of LA, but ‘rough sleeping’ persists
VOL. 14,
LA officials assess remedies for ‘unlawful’ immigration enforcement By City News Service
By Joe Taglieri joet@beaconmedianews.com
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yearlong count of unsheltered Angelenos by the RAND Corp. found a significant decrease in the number of unhoused residents from the previous year, but those who remain may be increasingly difficult to move into housing, the nonprofit research organization announced Tuesday. The study of unsheltered residents of Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles and of people experiencing homelessness in Hollywood and Venice during 2024 found a 15% drop from the previous year, which researchers said was likely driven by more individuals gaining access to interim and permanent housing through government programs. RAND also reported that “rough sleeping” — living completely unsheltered without a tent, makeshift shelter or vehicle — showed little change. Rough sleeping is now the most common type in the three study areas, representing about 40% of the total population of people experiencing unsheltered homelessness. While researchers counted a nearly 700-person decrease in the combined unsheltered populations of Hollywood and Venice, that was offset partially by a 170-person, 9% increase in Skid Row. Hollywood showed a 49% decline, and Venice posted a 22% drop, according to the study titled “Los Angeles Longitudinal Enumeration and Demographic Survey Project,” or LA LEADS. “Our latest count found meaningful progress in reducing the number of the unhoused, as compared to the two previous years,” Louis Abramson, the study’s lead author and a RAND adjunct researcher, said in a statement. “But our results suggest
Unsheltered homelessness often involves “rough sleeping” without a tent, makeshift shelter or vehicle. | Photo by Johnstocker/Envato
that the remaining unhoused residents may be harder to engage and bring indoors,” Abramson said. “New policies may be needed to extend 2024’s successes into a future that looks meaningfully different from the one that current strategies were designed to address.” The RAND study is the largest count of people living unhoused in LA outside the annual point-in-time count organized by the joint city-county Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority. That countywide survey is conducted mainly by teams of trained volunteers and occurs during several consecutive evenings every January. Last year RAND’s survey staff counted unhoused people every two months in the study neighborhoods and surveyed 463 unsheltered people across the neighborhoods from July to October. According to the study, survey participants reported staying in the same location for shorter time periods compared with past years.
This finding is consistent with the removal of “shelter in place” orders and increases in sanitation and other encampment-resolution effort. Most common in Hollywood, such cleanup efforts move unsheltered people indoors but also displace them. The overall drop in unsheltered homelessness has mainly resulted from a reduction in tents and makeshift structures, leaving “a more transient, mobile and dynamic population,” according to the study. The fraction of unhoused people surveyed in Hollywood and Venice who said they were living with literally no shelter reached record levels — rough sleepers now dominate the LA LEADS unsheltered population, comprising 42% of all people who researchers inferred to be living on the street last December. “Because fewer unhoused people are dwelling in dense tent communities, it suggests that outreach teams will have to traverse larger areas to engage the same number of
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people, likely reducing their average efficiency,” Sarah B. Hunter, co-author of the study and director of the RAND Center on Housing and Homelessness, said in a statement. “As more people live totally exposed to the elements, their needs will rise.” Although interest in acquiring housing and transitioning out of homelessness remained high at 91% of respondents from the three neighborhoods, the number of people who said they were on a waitlist was still relatively low at 38%. Researchers also highlighted the finding that the demographics of Hollywood’s homeless population changed dramatically in 2024. The number of Black survey respondents decreased from 50% to 26%, and the share of white and Hispanic populations increased. As in previous years, twothirds of the Skid Row survey sample is Black, while the See Homelessness Page 27
ity and county officials in Los Angeles are taking action to combat the tactics of U.S. immigration agents amid ongoing enforcement operations in the Southland. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday directed its attorneys to explore legal remedies to prevent so-called “unconstitutional” federal immigration enforcement. According to a motion introduced by Supervisors Hilda Solis and Lindsey Horvath, since June 6, U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel have intensified immigration raids in the county, detaining people on streets, at shopping sites, parking lots and churches and have even attempted to enter schools. “Over the last few weeks, federal agents, often in unmarked vehicles, without visible badges, in regular street clothes and masked faces, have detained people indiscriminately, at times even taking U.S. citizens,” the motion stated. “This includes numerous reported instances of individuals questioned and detained without a judicial warrant and without reasonable suspicion.” At Tuesday’s meeting, Solis stressed that the Fourth Amendment protects individuals from unreasonable search and seizures. “When law enforcement officers stop, question, or detain someone without reasonable suspicion, or when they make an arrest without probable cause, they are indeed violating that person’s constitutional and civil rights,” Solis said. She cited data gathered by UC Berkeley Law that between June 1 and 10, ICE data showed 722 arrests in
Los Angeles, while a Los Angeles Times analysis found that 69% of those individuals had no criminal conviction, and 58% were never charged with a crime. The analysis also found the arrests were mostly men, with a majority from Latin America. Solis also cited data from the DHS that between June 6 and 22, more than 1,600 individuals were detained or deported in Southern California. Horvath said everyone is entitled to due process and deserves to have their civil rights upheld. “Democracy is not a given — we must fight to continue the best of our constitutional traditions,” Horvath said. “We cannot sit on the sideline as the rights of our communities are violated. We must do everything in our power to protect our residents and fight back.” Board Chair Supervisor Kathryn Barger said federal efforts were also undermining local law enforcement, adding to public fear. The board directed county attorneys to explore legal remedies to prevent “unconstitutional or unlawful” immigration enforcement activities, including “unlawfully stopping, questioning or detaining individuals without reasonable suspicion, or arresting individuals without probable cause or a valid warrant.” Approving a related motion by Supervisors Solis and Janice Hahn, the board on Tuesday also directed the Department of Youth Development, Public Defender, and Alternate Public Defender to develop a “Know Your Rights” campaign to educate youth participating in civil unrest. As a part of the campaign, the board called for the See Immigration Page 28