The Brief

Los Angeles will boost the number of housing and shelter opportunities for people experiencing homelessness and focus more on moving people inside rather than clearing encampments, under an agreement approved by a federal judge Friday.

The updated agreement from a 2022 settlement is the latest step in a long-running legal saga focused on the city's response to the homelessness crisis. It also means the city will offer nearly 1,100 additional beds and maintain its obligations for years longer than what was originally promised in the prior settlement agreement as officials continue to try to curb homelessness in the region.

Friday’s hearing was called by U.S. District Judge David O. Carter, who has been overseeing the settlement in a lawsuit brought against the city by the L.A. Alliance for Human Rights, a group of downtown business and property owners.

Here are some key takeaways of the new agreement, which is detailed in 24 pages of court documents:

• The city will create a total of 14,000 housing and shelter opportunities by the end of June 2027, an increase from the 2022 settlement.
• L.A. will keep open at least 12,915 housing or shelter opportunities until the end of June 2029. The original agreement ended June 2027.
• The city will make sure that 19,600 people experiencing homelessness are moved into housing or shelter beds rather than being obligated to clear thousands of encampments.
• Reports will be filed with the court detailing L.A.’s housing and shelter, including the total number of people experiencing homelessness served. 
• The court can appoint a monitor to help oversee and enforce the agreement, which the judge also approved Friday.

Matthew Umhofer, one of the attorneys for L.A. Alliance, told LAist after the hearing that the new agreement means “accountability” for the city of Los Angeles.

“We now have the city to a point where it's actually committed to doing what it promised to do under the agreement,” Umhofer said. “We have an extension of the agreement. We have more beds coming in. It's a really good result.”

There are more than 43,500 people experiencing homelessness across L.A., with a majority living on the street rather than in shelters, according to the latest point-in-time count.

During the brief hearing, Carter thanked the parties for their work and acknowledged that they were required to make difficult decisions “for the benefit of the public.”

Carter said the agreement underscores “public need for transparency and accountability” moving forward.

What will the data monitor do? 

The data monitor is now Nardello & Co, a global investigations firm that was approved by the L.A. City Council in closed session earlier this week.

The team will be led by Wendy Wu, the head of digital investigations and cyber risk, who is based in Los Angeles.

Under the updated agreement, the monitor responsibilities include:

• Verifying the number of housing or shelter opportunities created, the address and the number of beds opened, as well as the number of people experiencing homelessness served under the court agreements, according to documents.
• The monitor is able to do field work, including observing Inside Safe operations.
• The monitor cannot have direct access to any database maintained by the city or Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority without “extraordinary good cause."
• The monitor can report issues to the court if concerns around city data and verification go unresolved.

What does the new agreement mean for LA? 

The judge’s approval also means that a months-long hearing that considered whether to hold the city in contempt of court is over.

The latest agreement means there will be no more witness testimony, no rulings and no contempt sanctions tied to the hearing, according to court documents.

Attorneys for the city repeatedly pushed back against the contempt hearing, filing objections with the judge and making an unsuccessful emergency request with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to block it from happening.

The hearing, which started last November, called several witnesses to testify, including officials with the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority and Matt Szabo, the L.A. city administrative officer.

The parties have been in “extensive mediation efforts to resolve the various disagreements” since last December with another judge, according to court documents. Carter ended up continuing the contempt proceedings in February, encouraging the parties to continue to work toward an agreement in mediation.

On Tuesday, nearly three months later, the parties reached a resolution for the contempt hearing and the city’s various appeals.

The Los Angeles Catholic Worker and Los Angeles Community Action Network are considered “intervenors” in the suit, representing people experiencing homelessness. Their attorneys include those from the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles.

Shayla Myers, director of Impact Litigation and Policy at the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, said from the intervenors’ perspective, the most important aspect of the new agreement is that it does away with the encampment reduction plan — which included clearing 9,800 tents, makeshift shelters, cars and RVs — and instead focuses on measuring the number of unhoused people brought into shelters and housing.

“That is the only thing that has ever solved homelessness, destroying unhoused people's property has always made it worse,” Myers told LAist after the hearing. “The fact that the earlier settlement agreement included that quota — it was a dark day for these court proceedings and removing it is a substantial step forward in recognizing what's at stake in this case.”

How did we get here? 

L.A. Alliance sued the city and county in 2020, accusing both of failing to adequately address homelessness by not providing enough shelter and housing for thousands of unhoused people.

In May 2022, the city and L.A. Alliance entered into the settlement agreement, which was approved by the court about a month later.

Umhofer noted that they’ve been involved in the case since before the pandemic, and “the fight is not over.” But he said there are people who will advocate for those suffering on the streets.

“The goal really is to get people off the streets, into treatment, into shelter, into housing and back on their feet,” he said. “And I'm hopeful that this agreement helps.”

Bradley Hamburger, an attorney with Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, the law firm representing the city, declined to comment after the hearing.

Southern California was built on radio.

"I can still hear the jingle KFWB News 98,” wrote  Taline in Los Feliz, during a recent conversation on LAist's daily news show, AirTalk, which airs on 89.3 FM. “I grew up hearing that in my dad's minivan on the way to and from school. It has a special place in my heart.”

Back in April, broadcast company Audacy announced KNX News — one of the last-remaining all-news FM stations — was leaving the FM dial where it had simulcast on 97.1 FM since 2021. The station, which is also one of the oldest in L.A., is not budging from 1070 AM where it has been on the air for more than 100 years. The move away from FM officially happened in May to make way for a new sports talk station, which Audacy officials called an area of growth for advertisers in today’s media landscape.

The move is one in a long line of changes for radio and a reminder that before podcasts, playlists and algorithms, many Southern Californians built their days around radio broadcasts.

Radio, a daily ritual

The construction of KNX

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Herman J. Schultheis

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Los Angeles Public Library

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Michael Jackson, a well-known KNX, personality

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Los Angeles Public Library

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Larry Mantle, now in his 41st year hosting AirTalk, remembers being a kid and dreaming of what it might be like to be behind the mic at one of these radio stations.

“ I grew up with KNX," he said. “My dream job as a kid was to be an anchor on KNX or KFWB, the two local all-news radio stations, 'cause there was nothing like hosting AirTalk that even existed at that point.”

Mantle opened up the phone lines on a recent show to hear from his fellow SoCal radio lovers about the shows they miss and the memories they have. Here's what they had to say:

A love for radio, then and now  

A pilot of KMPC's traffic alert helicopter pictured with his daughter and grandson.

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Los Angeles Public Library

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A 1963 picture of Valley State College (now Los Angeles Valley College) preparing to launch KVCM

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Larry Leach

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Los Angeles Public Library

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“When you'd walk down Hollywood Boulevard where the station was, you could hear it playing as you went down the street,” said  Olivia in Glendale about KLAC 570 with Al Jarvis.

 Larry in Yorba Linda shouted out KBCA Jazz for its 24-hour jazz, saying “When I first moved out here in '68 from Phoenix, which had like an hour a week, it was a real wonder.”

 Mark in Glassell Park emailed that he loves KCRW’s Henry Rollins, writing, “I used to bristle at his unique DJ persona, but over time, I came to love him and his crazy eclectic playlists. I find his knowledge in history and punk rock fascinating. He's a gem and a legend."

"I'd like to give a shout-out to all the DJs working at KXLU, the college station at Loyola Marymount University, said  Jeremy in Culver City in an email. “That station's been on the air for nearly 60 years. I believe it's one of the best examples of what's possible with radio."

"KFWB and KRLA back in the day when they were rock music stations —  Dr. Demento, one of my favorite on-air personalities, also had eclectic music taste," said  Carrie in Desert Edge.

“ Dr. Demento was must listening when I was a kid in junior high school at Le Conte Junior High in Hollywood,” Mantle added. “Every Sunday night on KMET, we would make sure we were listening to Dr. Demento and his funny records.”

The question remains…

An 11-year-old winning a car in a KMPC contest in 1963.

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Los Angeles Public Library

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Listener support is vital to any radio station, and it’s clear KNX has many lifelong fans. AirTalk listeners highlighted their support for household KNX names over the decades like Bill Keene, Melinda Lee, Mike Roy and Jackie Olden.

As KNX makes changes, many are watching closely and thinking about the future of radio.

Listeners like Tommy in La Quinta are left wondering if the radio dial will be the same…

“I’m a hardcore listener, but I don't know about casual listeners [and] if they'll tune to AM,” he said.

After months of hand-wringing, Los Angeles and LA28 have come to a tentative agreement on how Olympics organizers will reimburse the city for its expenses for the 2028 Summer Games.

According to the deal, the private Olympic organizing committee will pay upfront for the estimated cost of services that are not eligible for federal reimbursement, like trash pick-up and traffic control. Under another proposal, the city would also be able to tap an LA28 contingency fund if it isn't fully repaid by the federal government for policing costs at Olympic venues.

The agreement is nearly nine months overdue and still needs approval by Mayor Karen Bass and the City Council.

The 2028 Olympics are intended to be privately financed, and an existing city agreement with LA28 states that the Olympics organizers, not L.A., will pay for extra costs for public services in support of the Games. But L.A. is the financial back-stop for the Olympics, meaning if LA28 goes in the red, taxpayers will pick up the bill.

Beyond that, the city services agreement presents another area where L.A. could incur additional unexpected expenses for hosting the Games. L.A. City Councilmember Monica Rodriguez warned LA28 CEO Reynold Hoover earlier this year that a bad deal could "bankrupt" the city.

Jacie Prieto Lopez, an LA28 spokesperson, and Paul Krekorian, who leads the city's office of major events, said in statements that the freshly inked agreement would help deliver a fiscally responsible Games.

"Mayor Bass’ priority is that the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games be fiscally responsible, protect taxpayers, and benefit Angelenos for decades to come. This agreement helps deliver that commitment," Krekorian said.

But the contract between the two parties doesn't fully resolve one of the biggest areas of financial risk for the city: the enormous cost of security for an event as extensive and high-profile as the summer Olympics and Paralympics.

Organizers are counting on the federal government to pay for public safety at Olympic venues that are considered part of a "national special security event." That includes costs for LAPD staffing. LA28 has not included security costs in its $7.1 billion budget — a fact that City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto criticized earlier this year.

The federal government has so far allocated $1 billion for security costs for the Olympics. Exactly where those federal funds will go has not yet been determined, and there's no guarantee they will cover all of L.A.'s policing costs.

To address this, city officials have also proposed an amendment to a 2021 agreement between the city and LA28. That amendment would establish that if L.A. is not reimbursed by the federal government for all its eligible expenses, it could dip into LA28's contingency fund of $270 million before the private organizing committee could use those funds for any legacy projects.

But that bucket of money will first be used for any costs that Olympics organizers still owe if they run out of revenue — meaning if the Olympics don't turn a profit, the city's access to that money will depend on how much is left for the taking.

Civil rights attorney Connie Rice, who has been tracking the city's negotiations with LA28, told LAist the agreement was a "PR document" not a deal. She pointed out that if the federal government does not pay up for security spending as expected, L.A. could be in trouble.

" It leaves the taxpayers with a GoFundMe strategy," she said.

The city services agreement lays the groundwork for more negotiations between LA28 and the city. Each venue will require its own agreement, to be negotiated by July 1, 2027. Venues in the city of L.A. include Dodger Stadium, the L.A. Convention Center, L.A. Memorial Coliseum and the Venice Beach Boardwalk.

The City Council's ad-hoc committee on the 2028 Games will meet Tuesday afternoon to vote on the agreement.