Spending More Isn’t the Same as Caring

CANDIDATE COMMENTARY - Walk down almost any street in the West Valley, and you can see the shortcomings of Los Angeles’ response to homelessness. A tent stretched across the sidewalk next to a bus stop. Needles in the alley behind a strip mall and under bushes along a sidewalk. An RV that hasn’t moved in months, and neighbors frustrated by conditions around it.

Los Angeles has spent billions of dollars on homelessness. Yet people continue to live on our streets, often without the care they need. Spending alone cannot be our measure of success.

Responsibility does not stop at City Hall. County government plays a central role in delivering mental health care, addiction treatment, and the safety net for people with nowhere else to go. If those programs aren’t reaching people on our sidewalks, residents have every right to ask why—and to expect the City and County to work together to fix it.

I grew up in this district. I don’t think spending more money proves you care. Results do. A system that lets people fall apart on the sidewalk for years isn’t compassionate. It’s failing them, and it’s failing every family, small business owner, and senior who has to step around the problem every morning.

Here are five steps that could move us toward a more accountable and effective response.

First, put the numbers where people can see them. A public CD3 dashboard should show how many encampments are in the district, how fast officials responded to each one, how many shelter beds are open, what every contractor costs per person, and how many complaints neighbors filed. You paid for all of this. You should be able to see where the money went without filing a public records request.

Second, stop paying for failure. Homeless service providers should operate under clear performance standards, with consistent oversight and public reporting. We’ve all read headlines about investigations into the alleged misuse of money intended to help people on the street. Those allegations deserve thorough investigation, and public contracts deserve close scrutiny. If a provider doesn’t deliver or doesn’t act like a good neighbor, its contract should be reviewed and, when warranted, ended. That shouldn’t be controversial.

Third, help has to show up fast and include treatment. The goal should be an outreach visit to every reported encampment in CD3 within 24 hours, backed by access to shelter, mental health care, and addiction treatment. A quick visit means little if there is nowhere for someone to go.

Plenty of people will say “yes” when the offer is real and arrives before things get worse. When people refuse available help, officials should use the legal tools available to address unsafe conditions and restore access to sidewalks. Keeping sidewalks accessible and treating people humanely should be part of the same effort. We need to stop pretending that leaving someone in a tent is kindness.

Fourth, keep people housed in the first place. Older adults living on fixed incomes can be one rent increase or major home repair away from losing their housing. These are people who worked their whole lives and now find themselves struggling to stay where they are.

Expanded aging-in-place support and home repair assistance could help prevent those crises. Keeping someone housed can avoid the financial and human costs of trying to re-house them later. It’s also the kinder thing to do.

Fifth, the County has to fulfill its responsibilities. Mental health care, addiction treatment, and other County services must be accessible to the people who need them. City and County leaders should make clear who is responsible for each part of the response, what resources are available, and where services are falling short. Residents deserve an explanation of how homelessness spending affects the money available for streets, parks, libraries, and public safety.

No one has every answer. But this city needs to stop confusing the size of its budget with the quality of its work. The people living on our sidewalks deserve better than another year in a tent. The people who live, work, and raise kids here deserve clean, safe streets.

We can do both, but only if we measure what works, stop paying for what doesn’t, and hold every level of government responsible for its share.

(Tim Gaspar is a candidate for Los Angeles City Council, District 3. The views expressed are his own.)