LOS ANGELES— Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass today highlighted progress confronting the issue of Veteran homelessness while pledging to accelerate efforts to permanently house more unhoused Veterans. These efforts will include connecting unhoused Veterans to more services, encouraging local landlords to rent to Veterans and improving departmental processes to connect more Veterans to permanent housing. In recent weeks, the City held engagement events with landlords who had vacant units available to share information and resources to help them prepare to rent to formerly unhoused Veterans who hold HUD-VASH vouchers.
“No Angeleno who served our country should sleep on the street,” said Mayor Bass. “We have made progress to support our unhoused Veterans by changing policy so that they no longer have to choose between their disability benefits and their housing. Now we must continue this progress by connecting them with available housing in Los Angeles and eliminating red tape in our way.”
This follows urgent action from Mayor Bass since taking office, including:
Coordinating closely with HACLA to help interested landlords rent housing to Veterans by participating in the Veteran housing voucher program known as HUD-VASH. More than 50 landlords attended a resource and information event, leading to 65 scheduled apartment viewings for Veterans.
Changing federal policy so that disability benefits do not count toward income, making more Veterans eligible for housing and increasing their housing options. This policy change was a direct result of advocacy from Mayor Bass and the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ Task Force on Homelessness to the federal government.
Expediting access to housing for Veterans by securing waivers from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that created more flexibility to move people into housing faster.
Securing a historic agreement with the White House and the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness to make L.A. one of five cities to join ALL INside, a first-of-its-kind initiative to address unsheltered homelessness all across the country.
In Congress, Mayor Bass worked with her fellow congressmembers and Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary Denis McDonough to help ensure permanent housing is available to Veterans on the West L.A. VA Medical Center campus. Today, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced a decline in Veteran homelessness and a national commitment to continue making progress toward housing more Veterans. The 2024 Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority Point-In-Time Count reported a 22.9% decline in Veteran homelessness.
Since her first day in office when she declared an unprecedented emergency on the homelessness crisis, Mayor Karen Bass has driven change in how we address homelessness with new initiatives to bring people living in encampments inside. She has also worked to prevent people from losing their homes and to lock arms across all levels of government to move people inside and save lives and restore neighborhoods.