Tenants rally outside of an apartment complex damaged in the Eaton Fire in Altadena, California, in March. They called for the management company and government officials to restore utility services to the building and provide toxic remediation.
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Photo by Mario Tama
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Getty Images via Grist
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Topline:
The average rent in the Los Angeles area rose by 20% in the two weeks after the Eaton and Palisades fires — double the maximum allowable increase under California law. Concerns about price-gouging of rental apartments have appeared after numerous recent wildfires, including the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise and the 2021 Marshall Fire in Boulder.
Tackling price-gouging: California Attorney General Rob Bonta has sent more than 750 warning letters since the fires to property owners who may have price gouged, but has initiated only four lawsuits, and so far not obtained a conviction. The city attorney of Los Angeles has filed a few of its own lawsuits, including against Airbnb, but the district attorney for much larger Los Angeles County has not filed a single price-gouging case. Legal nonprofits say they can’t pick up the slack because they need a named victim
Stricter regulations: The epidemic of price-gouging in L.A. after the fires has also triggered new progress on the difficult issue of enforcement. A group of tenant advocates known as The Rent Brigade began an unprecedented crowdsourcing campaign to track and shame price-gougers. Thanks in part to the group's pressure, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted in July to create a new system for penalizing price spike activity. Instead of waiting for a prosecutor or a legal nonprofit to file a court complaint against a landlord, the local government could slap the landlord with an administrative fine.
This story is part of The Disaster Economy, a Grist series exploring the often chaotic, lucrative world of disaster response and recovery. It was produced by Grist and co-published with LAist. It is published with support from the CO2 Foundation.
Last January, a series of massive wildfires broke out across the Los Angeles area, fueled by high winds and dry temperatures. The fires raged for weeks, incinerating entire neighborhoods in the wealthy Pacific Palisades and in middle-class Altadena. They killed at least 30 people and destroyed at least 10,000 homes.
As the embers cooled, thousands of displaced Angelenos scrambled to find new housing in a rental market that was already among the nation’s toughest. They scoured Zillow and Airbnb for units they could afford on short notice. What they found were sky-high prices gouged by property owners and real estate agents rushing to capitalize on the surge in demand.
Dawn Smith and her family had rented in Altadena for nine years. After their home burned in the Eaton Fire, she combed through online listings for a similar alternative. But options were $10,000 a month or more, triple what she had been paying before the fire.
Eventually, she found a smaller place in Sherman Oaks, more than an hour away, for a still-astonishing $7,800. Her renter’s insurance would cover the difference for a few months, but not for the whole term of the lease. Now, as her insurance comes close to expiring, she and her husband are trying to figure out where to go next.
“The prices were insane,” she told Grist, “but because we had to find somewhere, we rented.”
Controversies over price-gouging play out all over the country in the wake of natural disasters as victims scramble for essential goods. Officials in New Jersey went after price-gouging gas stations after Hurricane Sandy; officials in North Carolina went after scam contractors after Hurricane Florence; and Florida prosecutors said they received more than 100 complaints after last year’s Hurricane Milton.
Most states have laws that prohibit such behavior, but they are difficult to enforce in the chaos of disaster, and some economists contend that they can backfire and cause shortages or hoarding.
A map of reported rent-gouging across Los Angeles County in the wake of the January wildfires, courtesy of The Rent Brigade
But housing is a special case. Overpaying for water or gasoline might be difficult, but overpaying for a rental apartment is a long-term commitment that can lead to bankruptcy or eviction down the road. Concerns about price-gouging of rental apartments have appeared after numerous recent wildfires, including the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise and the 2021 Marshall Fire in Boulder. But prosecutors and public officials have largely failed to deter or punish this illegal behavior.
Two days after wildfires broke out in Los Angeles last January, tech founder Edward Kushins and real estate agent Willie Baronet-Israel hiked the price of a home they were renting out in the waterfront city of Hermosa Beach by 36 percent, likely an increase of more than $1,000. The city is about 15 miles from the Palisades burn zone.
A month later, California Attorney General Rob Bonta sued the two, citing a state law that makes it a crime to raise prices for food and shelter during an emergency by more than 10%. If found guilty, Kushins and Baronet-Israel would face fines of up to $10,000 and as much as a year in prison.
But the Hermosa Beach listing was just one of thousands that were spiking in price. According to a Washington Post analysis of listings data from the firm RentCast, the average rent in the L.A. area rose by 20% in the two weeks after the fire — double the maximum allowable increase under California law. The home-rental company Airbnb also allowed users to raise prices above legal limits on more than 2,000 properties, despite its assurances that it would block such behavior, according to prosecutors.
The burnt remnants of an apartment building in Altadena, California, following the Eaton Fire in January. Many fire victims struggled to find housing as rents skyrocketed.
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Keith Birmingham
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MediaNews Group/Pasadena Star-News via Getty Images via Grist
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This lack of enforcement is common after disasters. But this time, it triggered an unprecedented campaign for stricter regulation of housing prices — and one that got results.
“The minimal enforcement that has happened has totally sent a signal,” said Chelsea Kirk, a tenant advocate who organized against price-gouging after the L.A. wildfires. “Landlords expect that enforcement does not exist.”
Three dozen states and the District of Columbia have laws that prohibit merchants from price-gouging during an emergency, but unlike California, which prohibits hikes of more than 10%, many of these laws are vague, prohibiting “excessive” or “unconscionable” increases without specifying what that means or what goods are covered.
“The laws are all over the place,” said Teresa Murray, the lead consumer advocate at the Public Interest Research Group, a nonprofit that focuses on consumer protection. Furthermore, enforcement of these laws is minimal — the government can’t be everywhere all at once after a hurricane or flood, and most disaster victims aren’t aware of their rights and don’t track or call out violators.
The stakes are even higher when it comes to housing, which is already in shortage across the country. Around half the nation’s tenants are rent-burdened, meaning they spend more than 30% of their income on rent. Wildfires and hurricanes often destroy thousands of homes in quick succession, exacerbating supply crunch in local housing stock.
Research from across the country shows that landlords often hike prices after major fires and floods. Asking prices for rental apartments increased by 25% after the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise, California, for instance, and by 44% in Lahaina following the 2023 Maui wildfires in Hawaiʻi. The increases even hit existing renters: More than a quarter of renters in Boulder said they saw hikes of more than 10% after the 2021 Marshall Fire, and a study of multiple flood events found that inexpensive apartments see hikes of 5% on average after a flood. These hikes hit low-income households hardest, forcing them to relocate or cut down on other expenses.
This same dynamic was on display in Los Angeles earlier this year following the Palisades and Eaton fires. One of the people who tested this market was Blanca, a woman who lived in an apartment building in Altadena, and who declined to give her last name because of her immigration status. The Eaton Fire destroyed her business and caused significant damage to the apartment complex where she and her husband lived. Even though their unit was intact, the building lacked water, gas, and electricity.
An aerial view of burned properties in Altadena, taken in July. Many of the homes destroyed in the January fires have not been rebuilt.
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Allen J. Schaben
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Los Angeles Times via Getty Images via Grist
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Blanca and her husband looked for other apartments, but all the available units they found were far too expensive, some thousands of dollars above what they had paid in Altadena for the same amount of space. They couldn’t afford anything like what landlords were asking, so after a few weeks, they moved back to their unit in the damaged complex and lived there paying rent in unsafe conditions for months.
“The place has not even been inspected, and many people have returned since February,” said Blanca in Spanish. “But there was nowhere else to go.”
In the first days after the fire, California attorney general Bonta trumpeted the state’s price-gouging ban several times — not only could landlords not raise prices by more than 10%, they also couldn’t list new units for more than 160% of typical market value. But property owners seemed either not to know about the law, or not to care.
Bonta, the attorney general, has sent more than 750 warning letters since the fire to property owners who may have price gouged, but has initiated only four lawsuits, and so far not obtained a conviction. The city attorney of Los Angeles has filed a few of its own lawsuits, including against Airbnb, but the district attorney for much larger Los Angeles County has not filed a single price-gouging case. Legal nonprofits say they can’t pick up the slack because they need a named victim in order to sue a landlord, and most disaster victims don’t have the knowledge or resources to pursue litigation.
“We have been a little bit disappointed, I will say,” said Rodney Leggett, the director of litigation at the Housing Rights Center in Los Angeles, which has sued a few property owners over the post-fire price gouging, including the company that owns the historic Villa Carlotta apartments in Hollywood. “We have gotten complaints of people seeing price gouging, [but] we have gotten relatively few … people saying, ‘I am actively being price gouged.’ I think a big part of that is it's really hard for people to track, and to know, the sort of price changes that have occurred.”
But the epidemic of price-gouging in L.A. after the fires has also triggered new progress on the difficult issue of enforcement. As Zillow flooded with overpriced homes, a group of tenant advocates began an unprecedented crowdsourcing campaign to track and shame price-gougers. Kirk, a policy advocate at the progressive nonprofit Strategic Actions for a Just Economy, was seeing numerous instances of price hikes, but she knew that Bonta’s office and local prosecutors lacked the capacity to track and sue every landlord who was posting high-priced units.
Kirk partnered with Lauren Harper, a data analyst and fellow tenant advocate, and together they took enforcement into their own hands. Forming a new organization called The Rent Brigade, they created a spreadsheet that scraped Zillow for apartment listings that violated the price-gouging laws, and also encouraged fire victims and volunteers to submit proof of gouging. In the first few weeks after the fire, volunteers submitted more than 1,500 examples.
Mike Nemeth, the head of communications for the California Apartment Association, the state’s biggest landlord lobby, told Grist that most landlords tried their best to comply with the law.
“The California Apartment Association takes seriously the legal and ethical obligations of rental housing providers during declared emergencies,” he said. “Most housing providers want to do the right thing, and our role is to help them navigate complex rules when it matters most.”
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Zoe Myers
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AFP via Getty Images via Grist
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Thanks in part to the Rent Brigade’s pressure, local officials in Los Angeles are now trying to step up enforcement. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted in July to create a new system for penalizing price spike activity. Instead of waiting for a prosecutor or a legal nonprofit to file a court complaint against a landlord, the local government could slap the landlord with an administrative fine, the same way it would punish a restaurant with cockroaches in its kitchen or a driver who parked near a fire hydrant. The fines could reach up to $1000 per violation per day, with an additional $500 per day for failing to cooperate with county investigations.
Jamie Court, president of the advocacy firm Consumer Watchdog, says this kind of ordinance could be a model for how to enforce price-gouging laws.
“This is desperately needed as a deterrent and to let people know that price gouging is not up to prosecutorial discretion,” he told Grist. “People need to know every violation could result in a fine, not just the few prosecutors choose to prosecute.”
Los Angeles County’s price-gouging will lapse at the end of August when the fire emergency ended, so the new rules will only apply the next time California declares an emergency for a fire, flood, or other calamity. But during the last months of the ban, Kirk and other advocates noticed something unexpected — and concerning. The rush of new housing demand from the fire had ended, but many landlords were still listing new units well above fair market rate.
The L.A. housing supply, Kirk and Harper concluded, was so limited that price gouging had become a normal part of the market. Even in the absence of a major shock like the fire, landlords were still asking for exorbitant rents, and tenants were still paying them. The emergency declaration was only going to last for an arbitrary period of a few months, but the overall housing picture was as bad as ever.
“When the fire started, we were seeing a lot of these units coming online for absurd prices from people who don't usually rent, maybe knowing that people coming from the Palisades would be able to afford those kinds of things,” said Harper. “But the further that we get from the fires…I think it's reflective of just high rents.”
Gab Chabrán
covers what's happening in food and culture for LAist.
Published June 24, 2026 3:39 PM
The konbini-style snack shop at Tiny's, stocked with imported chips, Japanese Kit-Kats and a refrigerated wall of drinks.
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Gab Chabrán
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LAist
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Topline:
Sang Yoon — the chef behind Father's Office, the Los Angeles gastropub institution known for its high-quality food and an uncompromising no-substitutions policy — has opened Tiny's, a new fast-casual burger stand and konbini-style snack shop inside Costa Mesa's South Coast Plaza.
Why it matters: For Yoon, the son of Korean immigrants who grew up between two worlds, Tiny's is the restaurant he always imagined but never had: an American burger stand meets an Asian convenience store, all under one roof.
Why now: Tiny's opened last week at South Coast Plaza, marking Yoon's first new concept in years and his first venture into Orange County — a deliberately accessible entry point for a chef who has spent decades at the top of L.A.'s gastropub scene.
Read on ... for more on what makes the new venture special.
Making your way through South Coast Plaza — the sleek consumer cathedral in Costa Mesa, a sort of mall of malls — past Uniqlo window displays and Pop Mart blind boxes, there's a good chance you'll eventually land at Tiny's, the new casual restaurant from Chef Sang Yoon.
The burger shack-meets-Asian convenience store is the latest from Yoon, best known for Father's Office, the Los Angeles institution where he's spent two decades running one of the city's most uncompromising kitchens — no substitutions, no exceptions.
Tiny’s marks Yoon’s first venture into Orange County — a deliberately accessible entry point for a chef who has spent decades at the top of L.A.'s gastropub scene.
The concept
Tiny's is the place Yoon wanted to exist as a kid.
Inside, you're greeted by shelves stocked in the style of a konbini, the beloved Japanese convenience corner store, with cilantro-flavored Doritos from China, elote-flavored Turtle Chips from Korea and, for the purists, the requisite Japanese Kit-Kats and Pocky too.
At the counter, a friendly employee greets you beneath a letterboard menu anchored by Yoon’s signature 30-day dry-aged beef burger. Starting at $9 for a plain burger, up to $12 for the Tokyo Dog dressed in bonito flakes and furikake, there's also salt and vinegar tots, french fries, miso mac 'n' cheese and soft serve that runs from Straus vanilla to Pineapple Dole Whip, available as a swirl, cup, cone or float. That's the menu, streamlined by design.
Chef Sang Yoon's cheeseburger and Tokyo Dog at Tiny's, his new fast-casual concept inside South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa
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Grid Vongpiansuksa
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Courtesy Tiny's Burger
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For Yoon, the son of Korean immigrants who grew up between two worlds, the idea of opening a burger stand with a konbini was about tapping into the happy place of his memories: after school with friends, trying out the latest snacks to hit the market to Friday nights with the entire family celebrating after a long week of grinding it out with burgers and chili fries.
"The corner burger stand is where life happened. ... What if those two of my favorite things were under one roof?" said Yoon.
Tiny the dog
Inspiration for the name Tiny’s came from a somewhat unlikely place: Yoon’s beloved Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. Yoon describes her as appearing extremely cute and friendly, but in reality, she was actually sassy and judgmental. Illustrations bearing Tiny’s "don't mess with me" vibe can be seen throughout the restaurant.
“People would rather hear this from a sassy, cute dog than me. So I decided that we should channel Tiny. And let this belong to her," Yoon said.
The food
The cheeseburger itself is simple: a thin patty topped with melted American cheese and Tiny's signature sauce — a blend of Kewpie mayo, caramelized gochujang, ssamjang and tomato — finished with pickle chips and a bed of lettuce.
What sets it apart is what you can’t see, the same 30-day dry-aged chuck Yoon has used at Father’s Office for over 25 years.
“I still don’t think there’s any product superior to that for the purpose of a hamburger,” he said.
The spread at Tiny's includes the cheeseburger, miso mac 'n' cheese, chicken nuggets, tater tots, fries and a jammy egg sando — a konbini staple in Japan.
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Grid Vongpiansuksa
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Courtesy Tiny's Burger
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The nuggets ($10) had a crispy, craggy exterior finished with visible seasoning crystals, a small but deliberate touch, and came with a fresh herbaceous dipping sauce. As for the chili fries ($8), the chili itself was sufficient as an L.A.-style chili (think Tommy's), but since Lao Gan Ma chili crisp was promised in the name, I was expecting that distinctive, crunchy, fermented kick — but left wanting more of it. It felt more like a whisper than a statement.
The miso mac 'n' cheese ($6) was a highlight of the meal, especially for someone who doesn't usually order mac 'n' cheese. Fresh ridged elbow pasta with a proper chew in each bite, and salty morsels of miso folded into a tight cheese sauce had me picking up forkfuls until it was mostly gone. Consider my position reconsidered.
Encouraged, I went back and ordered a Dole Whip ($7). The electric, tangy flavor, paired with the soft creaminess, served as a suitable exclamation point for my lunch that day.
With Tiny's, Yoon has built his most personal restaurant — accessible in price, but uncompromising in intention.
Could mall food now be on a new trajectory? Perhaps we've finally transcended corn dogs at Hot Dog on a Stick and cinnamon rolls at Cinnabon.
Anjanette Gile
is a news intern and senior at Cal State L.A. She attended the Downey City Council meeting for this story and interviewed city officials.
Published June 24, 2026 2:56 PM
People light fireworks in Los Angeles on July 4, 2025. Most fireworks are illegal in the state of California.
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Etienne Laurent
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Getty Images
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Topline:
The Downey City Council voted 5-0 to allow local police to use drones to patrol neighborhoods for illegal firework activity over the upcoming Fourth of July holiday.
The details: The vote, which also greenlit new fines for party hosts and spectators watching illegal fireworks, took place at Downey City Hall on Tuesday night. The ordinances were introduced by Scott Loughner, Downey’s chief of police, and James Eckhart, the city’s primary prosecutor.
The background: Downey has had significant issues with firework activity in the past and upped fines as a part of zero-tolerance approach toward unlawful firework discharges in 2024.
What the council authorized: Hosts and spectators of unlawful firework activity will be fined the same as individuals who possess or discharge dangerous fireworks starting at $4,000. Drones will be used by police to more accurately document instances of illegal activity and allow them to send citations directly to residences, according to a presentation by police.
Read on ... for more on how Downey is upping firework enforcement this Fourth of July.
The Downey City Council voted 5-0 to allow local police to use drones to patrol neighborhoods for illegal firework activity over the upcoming Fourth of July holiday.
The vote, which also greenlit new fines for party hosts and spectators watching illegal fireworks, took place at Downey City Hall on Tuesday night.
The move is part of a citywide crackdown on fireworks in Downey — the city currently only allows the use of “safe and sane” fireworks, which include sparklers and smoke bombs. As in many cities in Southern California, any firework that is projectile and explodes in the air is banned in Downey.
The details
The new ordinance will treat property owners, tenants, party hosts and spectators of unlawful firework activity the same as people in possession of or discharging illegal fireworks within city limits.
Dorothy Pemberton, a Downey City Council member, spoke with LAist after the meeting and explained her support of the ordinance.
“It's a message to send to people to try and be respectful of the neighborhood and just abide by the rules,” Pemberton said.
She explained that often people don’t want to take accountability for illegal firework activity, despite encouraging it through hosting events where fireworks are shot off or watching them on their street.
“They don't want to abide by the rules,” she said.
In addition to the fines, the new ordinance also allows the city to recoup the costs of emergency services used in response to unlawful firework activity, including payment for first responders, city equipment and any needed medical treatment.
How the new drone enforcement and citations will work
The drones are authorized to be used for the first time next month on July 4 and can be used going forward for high-profile events like New Year’s Eve and Dodgers wins.
The drones used by the police will be able to detect location and thermal signatures in order to identify suspects and allow law enforcement to send a citation to the property the firework was discharged from.
Scott Loughner, Downey’s chief of police, gave more details to LAist on what drone enforcement will look like this year.
“It's the first time we've done it, so it's kind of figuring out exactly what to do, but we have several different licensed drone pilots,” Loughner said. “There'll be two two-man teams, and they'll be overhead.”
Loughner added that the drones will not “be going into people's backyards, looking through windows, things like that. It’s more of you see it in the distance, you zoom in and try to target people that are causing disturbances.”
Loughner said the department may use the drone footage to coordinate with officers on the ground who are alerted to the illegal activity and then drive to residences to put a stop to it.
Downey staff cited six other California cities — Artesia, Brea, Stanton, Riverside, San Bernardino, and Sacramento — as setting precedents for using drones for firework enforcement.
Anaheim also recently started using drones to spot illegal fireworks.
There has been mixed public reaction on social media regarding drone usage in Downey. Some people have said they’re glad that action is being taken, given the adverse effect of fireworks on members of the community and their pets. Others have emphasized their concerns about excessive surveillance and the need to prioritize issues such speeding and car accidents that have long plagued the city.
Current firework rules in Downey
Currently, “safe and sane” fireworks can be legally discharged between 3 and 10 p.m. on July 4 in Downey.
Fines in the city start at $4,000 for the first offense of possession or discharge of a dangerous firework, $5,000 for second offense, $6,000 for third offense and go up from there during a three-year period.
This is the second time the Downey City Council has made changes to its fireworks rules in recent years. In 2024, the council voted to increase the fine for a first offense from $1,000 to $4,000.
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Crews clean the scene along Cesar E. Chavez and Eastern avenues, where gallons of crude oil spilled onto the street.
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Andrew Lopez
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Boyle Heights Beat
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Topline:
According to Los Angeles County officials, approximately 25,000 gallons of crude oil were spilled during the May 22 drilling incident — nearly 10 times the 2,400 gallons originally reported by county agencies.
Why the numbers changed: A spokesperson from South Coast AQMD said the initial estimate was “based on visual observations made by first responders and reported to the California Office of Emergency Services.” But further assessment conducted by the pipeline operator revised the discharge volume.
Why it matters: The revised spill estimate reflects the severity of the incident that left roads closed for days, killed wildlife and sent oil into storm drains and the L.A. River.
How to file a claim: Residents and business owners who believe they were harmed by the spill can file claims with Pacific Pipeline System, the company that operates the pipeline. According to the pipeline operator, some examples of claims that may be considered include property damage, business interruption or loss of access, and cleanup or remediation expenses.
Three companies were issued notices of violation from the South Coast Air Quality Management District last week for their roles in last month’s East L.A. oil spill, as county officials revealed new estimates showing the spill was far larger than initially reported.
Approximately 25,000 gallons of crude oil were spilled during the May 22 drilling incident, according to L.A. County Public Works Director Mark Pestrella — nearly 10 times the 2,400 gallons originally reported by county agencies.
A spokesperson from South Coast AQMD said the initial estimate was “based on visual observations made by first responders and reported to the California Office of Emergency Services.” But further assessment conducted by the pipeline operator revised the discharge volume.
“The incident itself can be considered one of the largest oil spills into the Los Angeles River in recent history,” Pestrella said during a June 9 meeting with the L.A. County Board of Supervisors.
On June 18, South Coast AQMD sent notices of violations to Arcadian Infracom, HP Communications and Camarillo Drilling. Regulators said odors from the spill affected nearby communities.
The revised spill estimate reflects the severity of the incident that left roads closed for days, killed wildlife and sent oil into storm drains and the L.A. River. The scale of the spill has also prompted ongoing calls for more transparency from residents and community groups.
In a June 22 email to the office of County Supervisor Hilda Solis, the Maravilla Community Advisory Committee (MCAC) called for a community town hall and greater access to environmental testing results, public health guidance and cleanup updates.
According to South Coast AQMD, inspectors responded to three public complaints the day of the spill, reporting strong petroleum odors, including one from Esteban E. Torres High School. Inspectors later confirmed the odors originated from the oil spill site at the intersection of Eastern and Cesar Chavez avenues.
As cleanup efforts were underway that week, the agency received seven complaints stemming from the smell of petroleum and air quality in the area. According to the L.A. County Department of Public Health, odors may have caused or worsened headaches, nausea, dizziness, eye, nose or throat irritation, and breathing problems, such as asthma symptoms.
A South Coast AQMD rule and California Health and Safety Code prohibits emissions that “cause injury, nuisance or annoyance” to the public. Notices of violations can result in civil penalties, but if no settlement with responsible parties is reached, a civil lawsuit may be filed.
South Coast AQMD’s identified Camillo Drilling as the company responsible for rupturing the pipeline during the fiber-optic installation project. Arcadian Infracom served as the project management company tasked with overseeing the work.
The oil spill and fallout thereafter remain under investigation.
How to file a claim
Residents and business owners who believe they were harmed by the spill can file claims with Pacific Pipeline System, the company that operates the pipeline, by calling (877) 817-5465.
Rows of tents at the O Lot Safe Sleeping site in San Diego on Aug. 12, 2024. The city of San Diego opened the site in 2023 to offer temporary shelter for unhoused residents after it began implementing the Unsafe Camping Ordinance, which bans homeless encampments.
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Adriana Heldiz
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CalMatters
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Topline:
The Trump administration wants to shift more money to homeless shelters that require sobriety, a change that would disrupt California’s “housing-first” policies.
The backstory: It tried last year to move federal homelessness funds away from permanent housing and into temporary housing that requires sobriety. That move, which goes against the existing “housing first” policy favoring a no-strings-attached approach to housing, was blocked by a federal judge.
More details: The Trump administration’s callous decision to take a second bite at dismantling one of our nation’s most important homelessness prevention programs after a federal court already blocked the administration’s first attempt shows a complete disregard for the people who depend on this funding to keep a roof over their heads,” Santa Clara County Counsel Tony LoPresti said in a news release.
Read on... for more on the push to shift homelessness funding.
The Trump administration is renewing its push to change the way it funds homeless shelters and housing in California and other states, and several agencies say it could disrupt their services.
It tried last year to move federal homelessness funds away from permanent housing and into temporary housing that requires sobriety. That move, which goes against the existing “housing first” policy favoring a no-strings-attached approach to housing, was blocked by a federal judge.
Now, the Trump administration is trying again. Once again, it’s facing pushback.
This week, a group that includes the National Alliance to End Homelessness and Santa Clara County filed a challenge in Rhode Island’s federal court to the Trump administration’s latest funding guidelines.
The Trump administration’s callous decision to take a second bite at dismantling one of our nation’s most important homelessness prevention programs after a federal court already blocked the administration’s first attempt shows a complete disregard for the people who depend on this funding to keep a roof over their heads,” Santa Clara County Counsel Tony LoPresti said in a news release.
More than $4 billion in federal funding is at stake. The National Alliance to End Homelessness estimates the proposed changes could cost California nearly $238 million for permanent housing, and threaten to put nearly 15,000 Californians back on the street.
“The ‘housing first’ experiment failed Americans by warehousing the vulnerable without results. This ideology promised to end homelessness. Instead, billions of taxpayer dollars were spent while homelessness increased to record levels,” HUD Secretary Scott Turner said in a news release earlier this month.
