Audit of LA's anti-camping law shows about $3 million spent and just two people given permanent housing

An audit of Los Angeles' anti-camping law shows that in three years since going into effect, just two unhoused people have been provided permanent housing while more than $3 million has been spent on implementation and enforcement, according to a city memo released on Friday. 

The policy, which is also known as 41.18 of the Los Angeles Municipal Code that it was created, was enacted into law on Sept. 3, 2021. It regulates where people can sit, lie, sleep or maintain their personal property either on or around specific public spaces. 

Los Angeles City Council members approved the policy in hopes of preventing the obstruction of public spaces, addressing safety concerns near certain places like schools and reduce the amount of homeless encampments across the city. 

Over the three years, Los Angeles Homeless Service Authority and other service providers have engaged nearly 175 encampments, where a total of 1,856 homeless people lived. Of those, 313 were placed into temporary housing while just two were able tof ind permanent housing for a placement rate of nearly 17%. 

LAHSA says that 81% of the encampment sites were repopulated, but numbers of individual-level data shows that the average repopulation return across all encampments was 39%, which means that about 4 in 10 people returned to their encampment within two weeks. 

"Our office estimates that the city spent approximately $3 million on ordinance implementation between September 2021 and December 2023," said the city's Chief Legislative Analyst in the memo released Friday. "The $3 million figure represents a minimum estimate because multiple departments, including the Los Angeles Police Department, were unable to disaggregate their labor costs associated with 41.18-specific expenditures from their departmental expenditures."

The report shows that LAPD issued 3,183 citations to people for violating 41.18 between Jan. 2021 and Dec. 2023, about 75% of which came from the Devonshire, West Los Angeles and Rampart divisions. 

"Areas with a greater number of citations are due to increased training on the proper policy and procedure for enforcement of LAMC Section 41.18, responding to crime trends within their area, and a commitment to addressing community concerns," Tso's report said. 

LAPD officials report that the policy has thus far had an "overwhelmingly positive" impact on public safety by helping reduce the amount of encampments were chronic violence and crime had continually occurred. 

The city council's Housing and Homeless Committee will review the report at a later time.