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2025 count shows 2nd straight homelessness decrease in LA area
VOL. 29,
Trump administration to appeal judge's halt to LA deportation ops By Joe Taglieri joet@beaconmedianews.com
By Joe Taglieri joet@beaconmedianews.com
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second consecutive annual survey in the Los Angeles area showed a drop in the number of people experiencing homelessness, according to data released Monday. The 2025 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count by the LA Homeless Services Authority reported a 4% decrease in the number of unhoused residents countywide, and the city of Los Angeles showed a 3.4% decline. The combined total of people experiencing sheltered and unsheltered homelessness was 72,308 in LA County, with 43,699 in the city of Los Angeles. Unsheltered homelessness in the county decreased 9.5% compared with 2024 and has dropped 14% since 2023, data shows. An 8.5% increase of people living unsheltered who moved into shelters and other forms of temporary housing. The county's unsheltered homeless population totaled 47,413 people. In the city of LA, unsheltered homelessness decreased 7.9%, according to the 2025 count data, and it has decreased 17.5% over the last two years. The city's lower unsheltered numbers — 26,972 people — accompanied a 4.7% increase in unsheltered individuals finding temporary housing. “Homelessness has gone down two years in a row because we chose to act with urgency and reject the broken status quo of leaving people on the street
Freeway overpasses are common sites for homeless encampments.| Photo courtesy of haymarketrebel/ Flickr (CC0)
until housing was built," LA Mayor Karen Bass said in a statement. "These results aren’t just data points — they represent thousands of human beings who are now inside, and neighborhoods that are beginning to heal. "This Point in Time Count makes one thing clear: change is possible when we refuse to accept encampments as normal and refuse to leave people behind," Bass said, adding that her "commitment to confront this crisis head-on is stronger and more urgent than ever." The 2025 point-in-time count took place Feb. 18, 19 and 20 after a postponement in January because of wildfires that devastated large areas of LA County and city. Thousands of volunteers fanned out across
the county to conduct the survey. LAHSA, which is a citycounty joint agency, credited initiatives such as the city's Inside Safe and county's Pathway Home for the drop in unsheltered homelessness. Agency officials also noted a rise in the number of permanent housing placements to a record of 27,994 last year. Despite the two-year downtrend, 485,000 more affordable units are needed to meet the LA region's housing, LAHSA cautioned. LAHSA was established in 1993, but the county has opted to defund the agency and create its own department to address homelessness. County Supervisors See Homelessness Page 13
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Lindsey Horvath, Kathryn Barger, and Hilda Solis hailed the homeless count results but said more work remains to address the crisis. Barger attributed the encouraging data to "three key components: sustained investments in housing and services, strong partnerships with our local cities and service providers, and a focused approach to encampment resolution — such as through the county’s Pathway Home program, which helps transition individuals directly from encampments into shelter and care. "At the same time, the count is a sobering reminder of the work that lies ahead," Barger said in a statement. "The fact remains that
he Trump administration intends to appeal a Los Angeles federal judge's orders that call for an end to "roving patrols" and alleged racial profiling that have occurred for more than a month in Southern California during the administration's nationwide mass deportation campaign. According to court records filed Sunday with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, administration attorneys are preparing to challenge the ruling issued Friday by U.S. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong. "No federal judge has the authority to dictate immigration policy — that authority rests with Congress and the president," White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement. "Enforcement operations require careful planning and execution; skills far beyond the purview or jurisdiction of any judge. We expect this gross overstep of judicial authority to be corrected on appeal." In Frimpong's 52-page ruling, the judge prohibited immigration enforcement agents "from conducting detentive stops ... unless the agent or officer has reasonable suspicion that the person to be stopped is within the United States in violation of U.S. immigration law." The order also bars agents from relying solely on factors such as race or See Immigration Page 12
ethnicity, speaking with an accent or being at bus stops, sites where day laborers are known to gather, car washes or agricultural locations as a basis for detaining people. Frimpong found that federal agents have been "conducting roving patrols without reasonable suspicion" during a crackdown on undocumented immigrants in the LA area that began June 6. The judge also ordered immigration agencies to make sure detained individuals have access to attorneys or legal advisers seven days a week and access to confidential telephone calls that are not "screened, recorded or otherwise monitored" at no charge to detainees. White House border czar Tom Homan was critical of the court ruling. "Look, we're going to litigate that order, because I think the order's wrong," Homan said Sunday on CNN. "I mean, (Frimpong is) assuming that the officers don't have reasonable suspicion. They don't need probable cause to briefly detain and question somebody. They just need reasonable suspicion. And that's based on many articulable facts." U.S. Attorney in Los Angeles Bill Essayli insisted that enforcement agencies have adhered to the law. "We strongly disagree with the allegations in the lawsuit and maintain that our agents have never detained individu-