Task Force Updates Community on Landscape of Homelessness

By ERIKA MARTIN | Reporter

The Pacific Palisades Task Force on Homelessness (PPTFH) held its monthly meeting last Thursday, Feb. 18 to share updates on its progress.

The group announced preliminary results from the homeless count, which found 88 homeless individuals and 74 encampments in the Palisades (for more on the homeless count, see the Feb. 4 issue of the Post), and that the Ocean Park Community Center (OPCC) outreach coordinators have brought eight individuals into housing so far.

Adam Murray, executive director of the Inner City Law Center, also spoke with the group about the nonprofit’s advocacy in housing and homelessness issues.

OPCC Outreach Coordinator Maureen Rivas said she and colleague Glanda Sherman have engaged with about 70 homeless individuals throughout the Palisades.

About 12 are females, she said, but the demographic is mostly males 40 or older.

Rivas said since many individuals “have a lot of fears about what we’re offering,” with the word “shelter” bringing up images of run-down facilities, the group is encouraging clients to accept services with pictures of their state-of-the-art transitional housing centers.

The group is currently processing applications for four additional individuals to come into housing.

“Right now while we have a massive amount of resources we’re just trying to get them all going,” Rivas said.

Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) Senior Lead Officer Michael Moore said the agency’s next initiative is to enforce laws surrounding tents erected on the beach.

“LAPD is going to have to get our resources together and address that issue,” Moore said.

“It’s not an easy undertaking for LAPD. It’s covering from basically the Getty Villa all the way down to the border of Santa Monica.”

Moore reported that last Thursday he went out on the beach near Gladstones and “only saw one actual encampment,” a sign that homeless individuals are getting better at avoiding police sweeps.

“They are narrowing that window of enforcement opportunity for LAPD,” he said.

Moore reminded the group that the laws are designed to give individuals an opportunity to show up in court rather than be taken away in handcuffs.

“Laws are not designed for custody because, frankly, we would overload the jail system if we arrested every homeless person who committed every infraction we see,” he said.

Neighborhood Prosecutor Veronica de la Cruz-Robles also clarified that the LA City Council passed an ordinance that recently came into effect amending the code that applies to tents on parks and beaches.

“It has made it harder to do the enforcement that we’ve been doing in the Palisades,” she said, because it has taken away prosecutors’ discretion in giving a warning, a citation or charging someone with a misdemeanor.

Under the new law, an individual must first be convicted of an infraction before they can be charged with a misdemeanor.

“It is enforceable. It’s just the changes made it much more difficult to enforce,” she said.

“But we are still moving forward and retraining officers to handle those types of cases.”

Since the law applies to anywhere that’s a park area, Robles said Park Rangers have been active in responding to homelessness despite their unit’s small size.

“They have devoted a lot of time to the Palisades, so we’ve been able to get some cases done and prosecuted with their help,” she said.

Robles also clarified that the city has two active lawsuits that are affecting its enforcement.

Due to the case Jones vs. City of Los Angeles, law enforcement cannot cite individuals sleeping on sidewalks between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m.

Lavan vs. City of Los Angeles also imposes a federal injunction prohibiting the city from seizing or destroying personal property left unattended on public sidewalks.

Murray of Inner City Law Center shared knowledge from his experience working with the nonprofit that houses 22 attorneys focused on housing and homelessness issues.

“It is a messy, complicated, difficult issue,” Murray said.

“The pathways into homelessness are many and the paths out of homelessness need to be many.”

With chronically homeless individuals only accounting for about a third of LA’s homeless population, Murray said the city and county don’t focus enough attention on those on the cusp of becoming homeless, adding that there are almost 300,000 such individuals in LA County.

“Those people are one thing going wrong away from being homeless,” Murray said.

“In some ways it’s amazing that we only have 44,000 homeless people in Los Angeles at any given time.”

Chronically homeless individuals have been on the streets  for at least a year, while other groups are transitionally homeless or at risk of becoming homeless.

Murray said he has only seen the housing crisis worsen during his time working with homelessness issues.

“I think things are worse now on the streets than they were, especially the number of homeless who are unsheltered on any given night,” he said.

“The percentage who are unsheltered in LA—about 70 percent—is hugely up from the last few years. I’m always hopeful, but it’s not a great landscape as you go out and walk the streets.”