County homeless plan wins key vote
Los Angeles supervisors move forward with a $5.6-million program that seeks permanent housing for the 50 skid row residents identified as most at risk.
Social service volunteers identified a 65-year-old homeless veteran as one of the people most likely to die on skid row in downtown Los Angeles.
The man, who suffers from kidney and liver disease and has lived for decades on the streets, belonged at the top of a new list of 50 skid row residents deemed in urgent need of permanent housing, county officials said. But identifying the 50, which volunteers accomplished recently through early morning interviews of several hundred homeless people downtown, was only the beginning.
Today, the county Board of Supervisors unanimously approved additional steps for the three-year, $5.6-million pilot program called Project 50, which is designed to provide immediate housing and services for the participants. Organizers of the effort, called "Project 50," must report back to the supervisors at least every 90 days, and board members directed county staffers to review the project's budget.
Beginning next week a county social service team of seven -- including a social worker, mental health employees, advocates for the homeless, a representative of the Veterans Administration and a benefits specialist -- will return to skid row. They'll search for the 50 people identified earlier and encourage them to move to county-funded apartments downtown and get regular medical and mental-health care.
Not an overnight process
The process of moving someone from the streets into an apartment could take as little as a day or up to six months, said Beth Sandor, Los Angeles field director for Common Ground, a New York City nonprofit group that is helping coordinate the L.A. effort. Common Ground launched a similar, largely successful effort to house homeless people living in Times Square.
Sandor said one goal is to streamline the complicated paperwork that goes into providing housing. Temporary rooms will be available during a transitional period, she said.
Skid Row Housing Trust, which helps refurbish housing for needy people, is providing 50 downtown living units for the program, plus two case managers, a medical exam room, offices and a support-group meeting space.
The top three people on the 50-most-vulnerable list have already indicated to outreach workers that they'd like a home, Sandor said.
Advocates estimate that more than 73,000 homeless people live in Los Angeles County.
