Garcetti’s spending program, which will be addressed during his State of the City address on Monday, reveals the mounting pressure he and others at City Hall are under to make significant headway on a crisis that has left tens of thousands of people living in poverty in streets, parks, and on coasts. Cities across the U.S. are relying on a similar playbook, using COVID-19 recovery funds to attack a problem that has confounded politicians for decades.
The mayor plans to offer $791 million in the upcoming budget year for actions to help homeless residents, increase cleanups around shelters and expand plans directed at keeping Angelenos from slipping into homelessness themselves, mayoral supporters said. In addition to that, he demands to roll over more than $160 million that had been allotted for homelessness programs in the current year but has not yet been spent.
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The spending proposal describes a nearly sevenfold increase from the mayor’s budget five years ago when he and other city leaders began noticing that much more money would be needed to handle the mess. If approved by the City Council, it would be the most that any Los Angeles mayor has allocated for homeless initiatives in a single year, said Matt Szabo, a deputy chief of staff in Garcetti’s office.
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For Garcetti, “homelessness is the most critical issue that the city faces outside of COVID recovery,” Szabo said.
Garcetti’s spending proposal reflects in part the city’s predominantly improved financial outlook. The mayor and council, who had been thinking of general employee layoffs a few months ago, are now determining how to spend $1.35 billion in federal recovery supplies.
The mayor’s recommended resources, set for release Tuesday, also comes at a time of increased frustration over the city’s handling of the problem among residents, business owners, and anti-poverty activists.
Homelessness now concerns every area, with tents and other structures lining sidewalks, alleys, freeways, storm drains, and even landscaped medians. In downtown Los Angeles, residents and business owners recently asked a federal judge to order the city and county to offer some form of shelter within 90 days to every homeless person on skid row.
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In Echo Park, Garcetti and other city leaders have attracted strong backlashes over their decision to clear a massive camp at Echo Park Lake. And on the Westside, residents have voiced alarm at a proposal to consider beach parking lots as spots for temporary homeless facilities.
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