On Thursday morning, the public woke up to the alarming news that homelessness had increased by 9% across Los Angeles County in the last year. But the roughly 75,000 homeless people in the county woke up to a day like any other.
Many woke up hungry. Many woke up to find their shoes taken or their backpack gone. Many didn’t wake up at all, having spent the night awake for fear of being robbed or abused in the dark.
In time, data from the Los Angeles Homeless Service Authority’s 2023 Homeless Count conducted in January and released on Thursday, June 29 will be used to direct resources to specific areas such as the Westside of Los Angeles where homelessness spiked by a disturbing 44.8%; or Central Los Angeles, where the greatest concentration of homeless individuals, a whopping 18,531 homeless live. The data will also help officials create strategies to help the growing subsets such as the chronically homeless and the unsheltered homeless, which in the count increased by 18% and 15%, respectively.
But for now, the numbers have no immediate impact on those living the data.
Among them is John, in his mid-30s, a former software engineer from the East Coast who has been homeless in Downtown Los Angeles for three years. His tent was recently stolen, so he has been sleeping outside of the LAPD station by Skid Row.
John moved to Los Angeles in 2020 seeking a fresh start after his wife died of cancer. He struggled to find a job and ended up living on the streets where he tried Fentanyl and, as a former opioid addict, was immediately hooked.
He’s been able to get clothing, healthcare and — at times — shelter beds from the many homeless organizations operating in the Downtown area, but like so many others he has not been able to access the one thing he needs most: an apartment.
“I’ve filled out information with a couple of different people — LAHSA, PATH (People Assisting the Homeless) — they said ‘we’ll call you’ but I’ve never received a…
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