The Brief

The number of unhoused people living in and around Los Angeles is trending downward, local experts say, but that’s not the case for at least one group: older adults.

In the city of L.A., the number of people aged 65 and older experiencing homelessness jumped more than 17% since last year, and more than 36% in two years, according to annual point-in-time counts.

Among the unhoused, older adults are estimated to be the fastest-growing population in California, experts say.

Meanwhile, organizations that serve older adults are pulling back on services because of budget shortfalls while bracing for the effects of the Trump administration's cuts to Medicaid. That means people are being turned away from free food programs, senior centers and other supportive resources.

And even before that, people who had housing were already struggling to keep it.

“They were having to choose between their medications, or keeping their lights on, or having food on the table, or paying their rent,” said Yvonne Sun of Special Service for Groups SILVER, an L.A.-based nonprofit that provides resources to older adults in need by meeting them where they are.

A pandemic-era flush of funds from local, state and federal sources boosted the number of programs and services these organizations could offer, but that money has largely dried up.

Eli Veitzer, chief executive of Jewish Family Service L.A., said especially for older adults, ending up on the streets is a matter of “life or death.”

“The stakes couldn't be higher,” Veitzer said.

What’s at risk

Many local organizations for older adults pay for the services they provide through grants and fundraising. But they also receive federal funding, particularly through the Older Americans Act, which was designed to boost community social services for older people.

They also get funding from the city and county of L.A.

At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the federal government funneled roughly $4.6 trillion to states and agencies to help people respond and recover, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

That money allowed organizations like SSG SILVER, Jewish Family Service and others to scale up. But it was temporary.

Now, leaders of those organizations say the services some older Angelenos rely on are at risk.

When older adults arrive at the ONEgeneration center, they sign in and select which activities they'd like to participate in.

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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On a recent Tuesday morning, about 100 people gathered at a senior center in Reseda, where they talked and laughed over trays of linguine, ground turkey and chocolate pudding.

Mark  Schneider, 82, of Panorama City said having lunch at ONEgeneration’s center means he’s getting at least one good meal a day, rather than relying on what he could find at food banks.

It also helps stave off loneliness.

“ My whole life changed because in this community you get to meet people and they're all friends, and you develop your ability to talk to people,” he told LAist. “I had lost that because I was alone.”

ONEgeneration runs seven sites throughout the San Fernando Valley. The Reseda location serves more than 6,000 people by offering meals, exercise classes, support groups and entertainment — including karaoke.

But as the organization struggles to fill funding gaps, some of those services might go away, according to CEO Jenna Hauss. Unless they can find alternative funding, she said they’ll likely have to decide by September to close one or two sites.

“The employees and volunteers that run them, they may no longer have a place to go,” Hauss told LAist.

Damien Valentino, 67, comes to the senior center every day, mainly to exercise and socialize, which he said supports his mental health.

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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Sandra Russell and Mark  Schneider after their lunch.

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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The organization’s Homebound Meals program will be the hardest hit, she said. It delivers hot food to older adults, largely serving those with physical and cognitive impairments who live alone and can’t drive.

About 30% of the Homebound Meals program could be cut in the area, Hauss said, which means about 100 older adults will lose access to the free food “ with no other alternative resource to give them, simply because there's nothing available.”

Hauss said the organization recently had to turn away a 101-year-old woman who was living by herself because the program isn’t accepting any new enrollments.

“We have to cancel people,” Hauss said. “It's awful.”

Corrin Nagasaka told LAist the ONEgeneration program is essential. She declined to give her age to a reporter when interviewed for this story.

“You're gonna say, ‘Oh, I don't believe it,’” she quipped.

Nagasaka explained that the meal deliveries aren’t just about the food. They are an opportunity for connection — to have a conversation, even touch someone’s hand.

“And that's sometimes all the contact they have the whole week,” she said.

Many people stick around after lunch to socialize into the afternoon.

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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What happened to the funding?

The “Big, Beautiful Bill,” signed by President Donald Trump on July 4, includes about $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid over the next 10 years and nearly $300 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programs, otherwise known as SNAP.

Veitzer said cuts to Medicaid, called Medi-Cal in California, will have “a negatively powerful impact” on what services Jewish Family Service L.A. and others like it are able to provide.

For example, he said, the organization may have to make changes to its Assisted Living Waiver Program, which helps older adults get into assisted living, and its Multi-Purpose Senior Services Program, which helps older adults stay in their own homes.

Both programs serve hundreds of Angelenos, he said.

The city budget will also have a major impact, the organizations’ leaders say.

L.A.’s $13 billion budget, signed last month by Mayor Karen Bass, included “pretty severe” cuts for groups serving older adults, Veitzer said.

The city consolidated its Department of Aging with its Economic & Workforce Development Department and Youth Development Department. According to the mayor’s office, the move was designed to enhance services for older Angelenos, including those who may be at risk of homelessness.

But some service providers say they’re concerned that older adults — who make up nearly a quarter of L.A.’s population — will get lost in the system. The number of people 65 and older experiencing homelessness in the city went from 3,427 in 2023 to 4,680 in 2025, according to the point in time counts.

“We're talking about a lot of subject matter expertise that is lost, and we're also talking about representation and visibility,” Sun said.

In L.A. County, chronic homelessness among people 65 and older increased nearly 8.6% since last year, according to the point-in-time counts.

Measure A, passed by voters in November, raised the sales tax by a half a cent. The money is expected to be used for homelessness programs and housing efforts.

But less than 1% of funding is set aside for programs specifically for older adults in the county budget for homeless services for the current fiscal year. There’s $5 million listed for Permanent Housing for Older Adults out of the more than $637 million total budget.

“ It's easier, and cheaper, to prevent the person from becoming homeless than it is to help them once they become homeless,” Veitzer said.

“For older adults … the consequences are more dire.”

In Los Angeles, Thai food is something many of us take for granted — as central to how Angelenos eat as tacos or sushi. But in 1969, when one of the first Thai restaurants, Chao Krung, opened its doors, the cuisine was so unfamiliar that its owners had to offer Chinese dishes to put customers at ease.

"My mom had a chalkboard — barbecue chicken, wonton soup, chow mein," recalled Amanda Maneesilasan of her mother, Supa Kuntee. "She'd start seeing people coming in, and then slowly introduce them to something Thai."

The restaurant mostly served L.A.'s scattered Thai community — years before Thai Town existed.

Boon and Supa Kuntee, along with Supa's sister, Nillaung, opened Chao Krung’s first location, a small storefront on Western Avenue, not long after the couple arrived in California in pursuit of a better education and a better life.

The family later closed that location for a second spot on Hollywood Boulevard, a narrow, single storefront where the same struggle to explain Thai food to Angelenos continued — and the same Chinese menu holdovers stuck around to keep customers coming in.

It wasn't until the family opened its third and current location on Fairfax Avenue in 1972 that Chao Krung began to take the shape it's known as today.

As Thai food became more popular and moved into the mainstream in the '70s and '80s, its clientele grew, boosted by staffers at nearby CBS Television City. You can see family photos in the space spanning the past few decades, in between statues of the Thai Buddha and colorful tapestries, showcasing Los Angeles' restaurant history.

Sisters Katy Noochlaor (left) and Amanda Maneesilasan (right), second-generation owners of Chao Krung, behind the bar.

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Courtesy Chao Krung Thai

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Second generation

As children, Maneesilasan and her sister, Katy Noochlaor, grew up in the restaurant — doing homework between tables, playing behind the building — wherever the family was, they were there, too.

Which is why it made sense in 2017 for them to step into their parents’ shoes. "We knew we would take over the restaurant," Noochlaor said. "We live and breathe that restaurant."

The menu still had vestiges of the original compromise their parents had to make to survive. The sisters, however, were determined to restore it to its true Thai roots.

For Maneesilasan, learning to make green curry from her grandmother was a turning point, almost a lightbulb moment, in her understanding of the cuisine.

Weekly curry nights

As part of the reclamation effort, the sisters have unveiled a new weekly Kanom Jeen Curry Night, Wednesdays only, which features a trio of curries and grilled skewers.

When I visited, small ceramic vats of curry crowded the table, alongside plates of rice noodles — steam still rising, their funky aroma enough to make a famished stomach growl.

The curries consist of Gang Kieaow Waan Gai, the green curry recipe they learned from their grandmother, made with chicken, a coconut curry base, fresh herbs, Thai eggplant and Thai chili.

Mae's Nam Ya Trout is made with tender bits of trout in a Southern Thai coconut curry, built on house-ground red curry paste, and is the most labor-intensive of the three, taking about five hours to complete. The Nam Prik is a roasted chili curry with smoky herbs and nutty undertones from peanuts. The layered flavors are savory, but when mixed with rice noodles, fresh vegetables, and dried chilies, they take on a new dimension — silky smooth at first, then leaving your lips burning the next.

A selection of Ping Ping skewers at Chao Krung, including roasted eggplant, lemongrass chicken, beef satay, and shrimp, alongside Isaan-style pork sausage.

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Sydney Yorkshire

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Courtesy Chao Krung

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"Curry is so important in Thai culture, it's part of our tradition," Maneesilasan said. On the trout curry specifically: "I can guarantee you can't find this anywhere else."

The skewers range from house-made Isaan-style sausage to a surprisingly spicy eggplant, glazed with roasted chili, garlic, and makrut lime leaf — a welcome kick from a vegetable so often relegated to the sidelines.

In addition to taking over the family restaurant, the sisters have also built their own ventures over the years — Tuk Tuk Thai, a street-food-driven spot now on Sawtelle, and Ban Ban Burger, a Thai-inflected smashburger concept located next door.

This fall, a second Ban Ban Burger location opens next door to Chao Krung on Fairfax, with the wall between the two restaurants coming down to make way for an archway connecting them. It's a literal and symbolic union of the family's two generational concepts under one roof.

It’s been nearly 600 days since the L.A. fires became one of the most destructive in U.S. history, yet the federal government has still not appropriated more than $15 billion in long-term recovery funds to help survivors get back home. That’s longer than the previous record of 500 days survivors of the Maui fires had to wait, according to After the Fire USA.

“ It's really like nothing we've ever seen before,” said Jennifer Gray Thompson, the nonprofit’s founder and CEO.

Deep partisan divides and repeated government shutdowns under the Trump administration have been major causes for the delays, officials say.

“Disaster relief should not be a political bargaining chip — but that’s exactly how the Trump administration has made it out to be,” Sen. Alex Padilla said in a statement.

The state has also lagged, with $2.5 billion in recovery funds only just starting to be released, according to reporting by NBC4.

Meanwhile, L.A fire survivors are facing massive financial gaps to rebuild, on average between $200,000 and $500,000, even with insurance. And as temporary housing insurance dissipates, many are now being forced to decide whether they can afford to rebuild at all.

“ The community is struggling and is fighting to come back — and determined to come back — but we are really lacking the state and federal support that is necessary to help get us there,” said Sam James, a sixth-generation Altadenan whose family lost multiple generational homes in the Eaton Fire.

James founded the Altadena Recovery Team to support fellow survivors in lieu of reliable government and insurance-funded safety nets. Multiple local creative financing efforts are also cropping up more quickly feed that gap.

“The delay is just really hard to rationalize given how much need there truly is on the ground,” she said.

In recent months, delegations of local officials as well as Eaton and Palisades fire survivors have traveled to Washington, D.C. to speak with lawmakers about the much-needed federal funds, which experts say can often be used to fill such gaps in finances.

In June, the White House requested more than $85 billion in supplemental funds, primarily to support the war on Iran. The next month, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass and L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger sent letters to the Senate Committee on Appropriations urging disaster needs be included in such requests.

“It's on D.C. to begin to move the narrative from an ask to a make it happen,” Barger told LAist.

Four U.S. senators from states affected by recent disasters — including two Republicans from Utah and North Carolina, as well as California senators Padilla and Adam Schiff — sent a letter in July expressing their concern that no disaster funds were included in the White House’s supplemental appropriations request.

The senators called the omission an effort by the Trump administration to punish Los Angeles and the state of California.

Gov. Gavin Newsom has requested more than $10 billion for what’s called “Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery,” which can help survivors finance their rebuilds, as well as help local governments rebuild infrastructure, such as water systems, community centers, roads and more.

“It's the largest bucket of money any community receives in order to recover after a disaster,” said Thompson, from After the Fire USA. “It can really help fill the gaps that people need to get home.”

On average, the wait for such funds — from appropriation to allocation — is two years, Thompson said. Yet it’s been nearly two years since the L.A. fires, and the funds have yet to be appropriated at all.

Laura Richardson pays $450 a month out of pocket for a drug that could keep her off insulin for the rest of her life. She's a California state senator — and even she can't get her own insurance to cover it.

Richardson started using a GLP-1 a year ago after learning she was pre-diabetic. Her state health plan does not cover it.

“If something is available to help you to be more healthy, to avoid comorbidities … why would we want to wait till a person became diabetic to help them?” she told lawmakers in a June hearing.

Her experience is not unusual. For many Californians, popular weight loss drugs such as Ozempic and Wegovy continue to be elusive despite their clinical promise. While prices are dropping, these drugs continue to be unaffordable for many; most insurers don’t cover them; and state programs, wary of costs, have rolled back access.

Senate Bill 1089, which would expand access to the class of drugs known as GLP-1s, is clearing its final hurdles this legislative session. The bill would direct the state to seek to partner with a drug manufacturer to increase competition and lower prices for GLP-1s under its CalRx program, a state program created to distribute popular, expensive drugs at a fraction of the cost.

It is unclear how long that could take, but it’d likely be a yearslong endeavor. It took the state three years to bring its $55 insulin into the market under CalRx. Today the state program also distributes albuterol inhalers and naloxone.

Richardson, an Inglewood Democrat, authored the bill, which is a watered-down version of its original, more ambitious form. Previously, the bill also sought to require that CalPERS, the health plan that insures 1.3 million public employees and retirees, cover GLP-1 drugs.

CalPERS opposed the bill and argued that the drug’s high cost would increase premiums by $28 per member per month.

Richardson added that she had discussed including GLP-1s in the CalRx program with the governor, and “he was very positively open to that.” State health officials have said that GLP-1s are among the drugs they are considering for the program.

A boom in GLP-1 spending

The bill follows California’s recent elimination of GLP-1 coverage for the treatment of obesity in its Medicaid program, known as Medi-Cal. The state cited growing pharmacy costs and budget pressures for cutting the benefit. The state still pays for certain GLP-1s when prescribed specifically for diabetes treatment.

GLP-1s have helped many people to better manage their obesity and chronic healthcare conditions. Obesity is a well-known contributor to conditions such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

State data show that the number of GLP-1 prescriptions solely for weight loss jumped from 20,000 to 700,000 between 2018 and 2023 across both Medi-Cal and commercial plans. In 2023, California spent $416.8 million on GLP-1 prescriptions for weight loss in the Medi-Cal program and commercial payers spent $405.2 million, according to state data.

An analysis by the Legislative Analyst’s Office found that during this time, California’s pharmacy spending nearly doubled, and tied that growth to drugs that treat diabetes, obesity, and inflammatory diseases.

California is not the only state feeling the burden of these drugs' popularity and cost: New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and South Carolina also recently eliminated Medicaid coverage for GLP-1s when used solely for weight loss.

Today 12 states cover GLP-1s for obesity treatment under their Medicaid programs, although Rhode Island will cease coverage in October.

Similarly, coverage of GLP-1s under private insurance varies widely; there’s no clear standard. Health plans have also pointed to costs , noting they are currently a key contributor to premium increases.

Alison Sexton Ward, an economist and research scientist at the University of Southern California, said that data show huge benefits for peoples’ health. Modeling projects long-term savings in healthcare spending as well as a narrowing of health disparities, but she noted it’s a tricky investment for insurers to make. There are significant upfront costs before plans may start to see savings because of the reduction of obesity-related health problems, and insurers may not capture those savings when people tend to switch health plans every few years, she explained.

“The thing about treating obesity is just because you lose weight today doesn't mean that your healthcare costs go down tomorrow,” Ward said. “There's been this unique pressure on these drugs that they pay for themselves.”

One pilot that researchers and providers are looking at is the new federal Medicare GLP-1 Bridge Program, a temporary project that seeks to bring down the cost of Zepbound, Wegovy and Foundayo to about $50 a month.

Patients seeking cheaper options 

Dr. Wayne Ho, an obesity specialist and researcher in Los Angeles, sees the consequences of patchwork access to the drugs in his patients. Patients who can pay cash or whose insurance covers the drugs tend to be able to better manage their health conditions. Those without access try other, less effective therapies.

“It's really disheartening to see because we have these wonderful innovative treatments that really are life altering,” he said.

The cost is also driving some of his patients to seek cheaper, compounded versions of the drug, which some doctors warn against because they lack FDA approval.

Compounding typically involves custom-making a drug for a specific need — removing an allergen, for example. Increasingly, compound pharmacies and telehealth platforms are offering versions of GLP-1s that swap out an ingredient or two. Ho says these compounded drugs carry higher risk because they bypass the FDA’s rigorous vetting and approval process.

Nationally, calls to poison centers related to weight loss drugs increased by 1,500% between 2019 and 2025, according to data from America’s Poison Centers. Studies and reports have shown that compounded GLP-1s are more likely to cause adverse effects and have a higher risk of preparation errors. A Binghamton University study found that the odds of hospitalization were higher for compounded products. The FDA also warns of the prevalence of counterfeit products.

Ho calls GLP-1s one of the best tools he has as a provider. He remains hopeful that affordable access to the FDA-approved weight loss drugs is on the horizon. Continued efforts by state lawmakers to expand access are a critical step, he said.

“I think there's more and more pressure to cover these medications as more and more scientific data come out to show how it affects the body in a very positive manner,” he said.

Supported by the California Health Care Foundation (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the care they need, when they need it, at a price they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

UCLA is launching the nation’s first digital humanities department and bachelor’s degree this fall. The new discipline combines classical humanities with technical know-how to examine a digitized and increasingly AI-enhanced world.

The major fuses technological tools for statistical analysis, coding, 3D mapping and data visualization with traditional humanities subjects like history, literature and global cultures. It’s a multidisciplinary approach to education that capitalizes on employers’ growing desire for recent graduates to think critically while also being able to harness new technology. And the major requires a great deal of teamwork among students, another skill hiring managers seek.

Students will learn how new technologies shape culture and the human biases that enter into the use of these new tools. Top of mind is the rise of generative artificial intelligence and training students to use it ethically while also understanding how easily it can produce misleading content.

Todd Presner is a UCLA professor of European languages and transcultural studies, and co-led the effort to create the digital humanities department. He said contemporary culture has witnessed a rift between computational subjects and the traditional humanities, and both are enhanced by merging the two.

“It's actually at our own peril when scientists are not speaking to folks in the humanities with historical knowledge, ethical knowledge, cultural knowledge, right?” he said. “And at the same time, I'd say when the humanities are not understanding the technologies in the world today, they also could be seen as irrelevant.”

Presner has taught a course showing students how to get under the hood of large language models, which store the reading material generative AI tools like Claude and ChatGPT use to spit out answers. “Students can essentially upload their own training data to some of these smaller models and see how easily they can be manipulated,” he said.

New major, old discipline

UCLA students will be able to declare digital humanities as a major this year, but campus professors have taught courses in the discipline for more than two decades. It’s the second most popular minor at UCLA, which was one reason the school decided to transform it into a major, said Alexandra Minna Stern, dean of the UCLA College Division of Humanities where digital humanities is based. Last academic year 750 UCLA undergraduate students took a course in digital humanities. Stern expects 50 to 100 students to eventually declare the major, and would be thrilled if 40 signed up this year.

The department will launch with 23 faculty, including lecturers, plus four staff members. Stern eventually wants a few more faculty, but UCLA’s currently under a hiring freeze. No academic unit at the university was cut to make way for the new digital humanities. Faculty hail from multiple humanities fields as well as information studies and data science, so classes will occur across several campus buildings.

She said at least one museum will provide internship opportunities. Based in the Los Angeles area, the Wende Museum specializes in collecting artifacts and oral histories of refugees as well as other dissident groups and digitizing them — a key aspect of digital humanities training. She aims to secure similar arrangements with other museums so students can further apply what they learn in professional settings.

The major’s introductory courses are clustered around data networks, such as statistical reasoning, and courses on culture, such as the symbolic history of Jerusalem or film depictions of antiquity. Upper division courses can center on how contemporary technology is shaped by political, cultural, and social forces or a class on social media data analysis.

One student’s experience

Kedaar Sridhar, 26, graduated from UCLA in 2022 with a computer science major and a minor in digital humanities.

The social media data analysis course was his favorite in the minor. For a class project, he and a team of students analyzed the hashtag “facemask” on social media while much of the world was still in the throes of COVID-19. He relied on the coding language Python as well as sentiment analysis tools to classify how different countries felt about face masks in public based on the social media posts featuring that hashtag.

If he could do college all over, he’d major in the new digital humanities program because it combines the application of contemporary data software with the probing analytical questions that the humanities embody.

“I think computer science is the what, digital humanities is the how and the why, and how do you actually apply it, and why is it important to be applied,” he said.

Sridhar credits the minor with landing him an internship at Microsoft. All the applicants knew computer science, but digital humanities distinguished him, he said. An interviewer asked what the minor entailed, and he said “it’s human-centered data storytelling, working with groups, working in projects, getting a tangible outcome.”

The interviewer said that’s what they’re looking for.

In the past year he co-founded his own company, Grantlytics, an AI-based platform focused on helping nonprofits fundraise by writing proposals, finding funding opportunities and identifying promising donors.

As an employer, he’s looking for much of what the digital humanities major offers. Without it, Sridhar would prefer a candidate with a humanities and coding or math background. But digital humanities “automatically is that interdisciplinary nature because it combines those two worlds together.”

What employers want

Sridhar’s preference for someone who is well-rounded appears to be backed by recent survey data.

Hiring managers who recruit recent college graduates indicated this year that these workers are mostly employable, but with caveats. The annual survey by the National Association of Colleges and Employers shows that the skills recent graduates are most proficient in aren’t what employers prioritize most.

For example, 99% of hiring managers say oral and written communication and persuasion skills are important. But the same hiring managers indicated that just 55% of recent college graduates score well in communication skills. The same goes for critical thinking: Around 94% of hiring managers rate this competency highly but they report that just half of recent graduates are able to gather data from diverse sources and draw conclusions or work well in a fast-paced setting.

Where recent graduates do better is in technology, but hiring managers care slightly less about those. About 75% of employers place high importance on adapting to new technology or using tech to achieve company goals; they say that about 65% of recent grads are competent in that skillset.

Stern, the dean, is careful not to overstate the promise of digital humanities to halt the freefall of the broader humanities as a major students want. The share of U.S. college students majoring in fields such as literature, history, philosophy and foreign languages is at a historic nadir — just 8% of degrees conferred were in the humanities, down from nearly 15% nearly two decades ago. The trend at UCLA is similar.

She knows things are tough for humanities departments, but “an art history grad is more likely to get a job these days than a computer science grad,” she said, citing data tracked by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. “There are ebbs and flows across time” with which degrees lead to jobs and that students gravitate toward.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.