LA County sends out volunteers for the 2024 homeless count

Los Angeles' annual homeless count has started, with volunteers fanning out across the city and county to estimate the number of people living on the streets. 

"I think a lot has been accomplished in a year," Mayor Karen Bass said. "I think the dedication of everybody that works to house Angelenos has really been stepped up with a sense of urgency."

Volunteers will use an app to enter their data, which is then used to calculate the estimate. The effort is no easy task.

"We have made very significant inroads. We do have concerns, however, because the COVID protections ended this year," Bass said. "We had the eviction moratorium end. We had other protections that ended, but at the same time we also were quick on the city level as well as the county level to institute renter protections."

In 2023, officials counted 75,500 unhoused residents in L.A. County and 46,200 in the city. This accounted for about a 9% increase from 2022, according to the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority.

Homeless advocates like Veronica Lewis from the nonprofit HOPICS are scared that the numbers may rise again. 

"I'm a little nervous that the numbers might go up this year, just because people are falling out of this economic environment. 

A study done at UC San Francisco found that 20% of women who end up homeless are victims of domestic violence.

"There's a lot of trauma and violence for anybody that's living outdoors," Lewis said. 

Bass said 22,000 people were moved inside during the past year. However, one of the major complications of the homeless crisis is providing services like addiction and mental health treatment. Bass, Gov. Gavin Newsom, and other top state officials are pushing to pass Prop 1, which would divert more money to get treatment beds online.