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LIVING CRISIS - An average of six unhoused persons die each day in Los Angeles County, according to the County Department of Health. People living on the street are especially vulnerable to cold and rainy weather, which is why having emergency shelter available during bad weather can mean the difference between life and death. Christmas eve 2025 brought 4 inches of rain and temperatures dropping to 57 degrees, making emergency shelter vital. But on Los Angeles’s Westside, where we live, the City left people out in the cold in a shocking act of disregard for human life and health.
As predictions of a major “atmospheric river” dominated the headlines at the end of December, we did our best to find out about shelter options ahead of time. Some of us in the Council District 11 Coalition for Human Rights had been pursuing this since October, when a group of concerned Westside residents delivered a letter signed by 31 residents of CD11 to Councilmember Traci Park’s office asking for a meeting with her about availability of bad weather shelters. CD11 staff met with representatives of this group via Zoom on December 5, and Juan Fregoso of Park’s staff assured that group that the Oakwood Rec Center in Venice and the Stoner Rec Center in West LA would be available when it got cold and rainy. He also said that during the previous rainstorm, people were given Uber vouchers to get to a shelter, and said that the same would be true for future storms.
On the morning of December 24 as the rainstorm intensified, all of us saw or heard about unhoused neighbors--some in tents, some completely unsheltered--who were getting soaked. This included elderly and some wheelchair-bound people. Ahead of the storm, LA Mayor Karen Bass promised motel vouchers would be available, and the advice from City Hall and from Councilmember Park’s staff was to check the Los Angeles Homeless Services Agency (LAHSA) website and call 211. So we did. We and other neighbors also checked with possible shelter locations in advance and on the day of the storm. The results of all these efforts to locate shelter were deeply dismaying.
The City’s failure to line up shelter was already becoming apparent the day before the storm arrived. The afternoon before the December 24 storm, one person went by the Oakwood Recreation Center in Venice, which had been open during the earlier winter storm, but staff had not heard anything about the shelter opening during the approaching storm. Others contacted the Stoner Recreation Center in West LA, which had also been opened during the earlier storm, but staff there had no information until the night of December 23 when a staff member said they had 4 beds for “fire evacuees” from the January 2025 fires.
As the storm raged on December 24, different ones of us tried various strategies to access shelter. One person called the Oakwood Rec Center, but the Director said the center was not open for the storm, and they were sending people to Stoner Park. We checked the LAHSA website, but it had no emergency shelter information--only directions to call 211. So some of us dialed 211…and things went from bad to worse. When we dialed 211, we got a recorded message saying “All motel vouchers have been exhausted”, after which callers were put on hold. One caller was on hold for an hour and eight minutes and then the 211 line hung up on him. Two callers finally got through, one after 46 minutes on hold, the other after over an hour. They were told “All our shelters are fully occupied”, and instead were referred to the Ocean Park Community Center (OPCC) in Santa Monica. One followed up with OPCC and was told that if people could get there they could get a meal, but that it’s a day center and would close at 5pm.
Frustratingly, after these fruitless efforts yet another person called the Stoner Rec Center and was told there were 15-20 beds and only one was occupied--this despite the fact that 211 callers were told the City of LA had no shelter available, and that Stoner Rec was not listed on the City website! What’s more, all of us who got through by phone were told that for the locations where there was shelter (OPCC, Stoner), people had to be able to get themselves there--no mention of Uber vouchers, which we had been told would be available.
We can’t speak about the City of LA as a whole--we only tried to find shelter in the Westside. But in the Westside on Christmas eve, City-provided shelter options proved utterly inadequate. We are shocked by the apparent lack of concern for our neighbors who had no place to get indoors during this storm. A record-setting “atmospheric river” was predicted for weeks--where were the resources to meet this weather emergency?
We of the CD11 Coalition for Human Rights are profoundly concerned and, frankly, angry that during the cruelest storm of 2025, the City of LA as a whole dropped the ball. We hope others will join us in calling on the City to make sure this never happens again. There are many city facilities that can be used for shelter from the rain, and there are nonprofit organizations that can provide cots, bedding, food and water if the City requests them. If there is a will to care for our unhoused neighbors, it can--and must--be done!
(Levy, Raphael, and Tilly are members of the CD11 Coalition for Human Rights, a coalition of organizations and individuals in LA Council District 11 that support the human and civil rights of unhoused people, advocate for safe, decent and affordable housing, and promote tenants' rights.)
