LOS ANGELES – Los Angeles County and City leaders this week secured nearly $70 million in funding from Governor Gavin Newson and California Housing Secretary Lourdes Castro Ramírez to further execute her plan to bring Angelenos living in Skid Row inside. The award is part of the Encampment Resolution Funding (ERF) grant and will be used as a part of a strategy that will bring thousands of Angelenos living in Skid Row inside in the coming years, connect them with an augmented level of services, and navigate them to permanent housing.
“I thank Governor Newsom and BCSH Secretary Castro Ramírez for recognizing the importance of issuing these funds to serve our Skid Row community,” said County Supervisor Hilda Solis. “This is the first step towards implementing the Skid Row Action Plan which I have been thrilled to champion with local partners and stakeholders. As the heart of the overdose crisis, Skid Row residents deserve the dignity of housing where they can receive the care they need. This action will help to bring hundreds of people indoors quickly and support their path to recovery. I look forward to working with Housing for Health and the City of Los Angeles to continue serving our most vulnerable residents.”
"Yet again, we are seeing the real, tangible results of locking arms at every level of government," said Mayor Bass. "The County has been there with us every step of the way as we implement Inside Safe and take steps to continue to bring Angeleneos inside in other ways. By working together, we secured this funding, which will be instrumental in housing Angelenos living in Skid Row by bringing in critical interim housing resources. We are facing a crisis in our city and Skid Row is the historic epicenter — but announcements like this show that we can make progress on this issue. I want to thank Governor Newsom and Secretary Castro Ramírez for joining us in taking action on this issue and working with us to get this important work done."
“This is welcome news for Los Angeles County, and we are grateful for this latest opportunity to team up with our partners — the City of Los Angeles, LAHSA, and the State of California — to address the crisis at hand,” County Chief Executive Officer Fesia Davenport said. “We will make full use of our expedited authority under the County’s local emergency to use these funds to expand programs and supportive services, and to alleviate the heavy toll of human misery in the Skid Row area.”
The funding announced was part of a statewide investment to help people move off the street and into safe and stable housing throughout California. The City of Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) was also awarded funding as a part of the same program.
Recently, funding from various different levels of government has been secured to address the homelessness crisis throughout the Los Angeles region, including $60 million for from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development for outreach and both interim and permanent housing resources, and $196.2 million from the State of California for multifamily development and infill development in the City of Los Angeles and across Los Angeles County.