The Brief

A $5 billion pot of federal money set aside to help people on the verge of homelessness pay the rent is running out of cash — and no one has a plan to keep the roughly 60,000 renters, more than 15,000 of them in California — from losing their housing after the last dollar is spent.

News of the imminent expiration of the Emergency Housing Voucher program came in a March 6 letter the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development sent to local public housing authorities, the agencies that administer federal rental housing assistance programs.

A final payment this spring may allow some agencies to keep their emergency programs running into 2026, the letter reads. But housing authorities were advised to move forward with “the expectation that no additional funding from HUD will be forthcoming.”

For the housing authority staff who received the letter, it remains unclear whether the program is winding down simply because it has run out of funds on its own accord or whether it represents a policy shift from the Trump administration, which has been on an aggressive and often uncoordinated cost cutting tear across the federal bureaucracy.

The letter came as a shock to Lisa Jones, CEO of the San Diego Housing Commission. Jones said the commission could conceivably pay its share of the rent for the nearly 400 San Diego renters currently assisted by the program through December. After that, she could think of no obvious way to make up for the missing federal dollars.

Jones spoke to CalMatters from Washington D.C., where the heads of housing authorities across the country had gathered for a conference and to lobby their representatives. As news of the end of the program has spread among her counterparts, “a quiet panic” has set in, she said.

Absent federal money, “we don’t have the funding to solve that problem,” she said.

The program was modeled after the much larger and well-known Housing Choice Voucher program. Also known as “Section 8,” that long-standing program pays at least 70% of the rent for anyone earning under a certain income and lucky enough to secure one of its scarce vouchers. The Emergency Housing Voucher program is more narrowly targeted at those in most dire need: people currently living on the street or in shelters, those just on the verge of homelessness and anyone fleeing domestic violence or human trafficking.

“It’s a group of people who, but for the voucher, would be at extreme risk of falling back into homelessness,” said Mari Castaldi, who focuses on state housing policy for the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, a progressive think tank.

The termination of the emergency programs comes at an inauspicious time for federal rental assistance programs across the country.

For decades, the federal government has offered Housing Choice Vouchers to fewer than 1-in-4 Americans who qualify for those benefits. In California’s large metro areas, voucher waiting lists — the time between when someone applies and actually receives one — regularly tops out at more than a decade.

That means few housing authorities will have many extra housing vouchers to offer anyone booted from the emergency program. Absent another solution, that would put housing authorities in the virtually unprecedented position of having to revoke assistance from people who are currently depending upon it to pay the rent.

“There’s just no plan in place to determine what would happen” in that case, said Alex Visotzky with the National Alliance to End Homelessness. “This could very well lead to thousands of additional people becoming homeless in California.”

Why the funds ran out

The emergency program was never meant to be permanent. Creating one of many COVID-19-era additions to the nation’s social safety net, Congress funded the emergency vouchers in 2021 with a lump sum of $5 billion. Once those funds were spent, the program was meant to come to an end.

The wind-down was supposed to be gradual.

After the program’s roll out, housing authorities were told to stop reissuing the emergency vouchers as renters exited the program — because they no longer needed the help, moved to a different city or died. That way, the program was meant to phase itself out of existence. The federal housing department was given until 2030 to spend all $5 billion.

That led many local officials and housing advocates to assume the program would be funded through the end of the decade.

The wind-down of the emergency program is just the latest shudder in an unprecedented upheaval in federal housing policy enacted by President Donald Trump. The administration is considering mass layoffs at the federal housing department, raising concerns among some housing policy experts about whether they can seamlessly operate federal programs, including Section 8. After temporary freezes on all categories of federal funding in late January, the administration, led by DOGE, its “Department of Government Efficiency,” has more quietly extinguished select federal housing programs. Earlier this month the City of Los Angeles stopped accepting new applications for its general Housing Choice Voucher program, citing uncertain support from Washington.

The federal housing department did not respond to repeated emails and voice messages requesting an interview about why the funds ran out sooner than many expected, and whether the news in the March 6 letter represented a change in federal policy.

“To me it just doesn’t sound right, that we’re so far off the mark — four years off the mark,” said Emilio Salas, executive director of the Los Angeles County Development Authority, which oversees federal housing voucher programs for 66 cities and all unincorporated communities across the L.A. basin.

Sonya Acosta, a policy analyst with the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, said she hasn’t seen any evidence that the end of the Emergency Housing Voucher program is the handiwork of DOGE. Instead, she pointed to a familiar problem as the more likely culprit: sky-high rents.

Since Congress authorized the new vouchers in early 2021, rents across the country experienced a post-pandemic boom. That’s even true at the bottom half of the rental market, which the federal housing department uses to set its rental support levels. Between 2021 and 2025, for example, “fair market rents” in San Diego’s Barrio Logan neighborhood increased by 43%, nearly double the overall rate of inflation during the same period, according to the department.

Because the housing voucher programs pay the difference between a tenant’s income and rent, soaring rents and stagnant incomes mean the government pays more.

“We’ve seen those really big increases in rent that has also meant that some of the spending might have gone a little bit faster than initial HUD estimates,” said Acosta.

That basic math problem has put the screws to the overall Section 8 program too. Jones, in San Diego, said the Housing Commission’s average per-household rental assistance payment at the beginning of the pandemic was around $870 each month. Now it’s roughly $1,400. Because the emergency voucher program allows for more generous payments and because its voucher holders tend to have even lower incomes than regular voucher holders, the average emergency voucher is about $2,200, she said.

“The gap between the rental market and the lowest incomes in our community is widening,” she said.

What happens when the money runs out

Without fresh funding, there’s no way many housing authorities would be able to transfer emergency voucher holders onto the regular voucher program.

In Santa Barbara County, for example, nearly 1-in-10 of the local housing authority’s vouchers have been shelved, kept out of the hands of qualified renters because the authority can’t afford to provide the assistance.

So once the emergency funding runs out “we have no way of helping those people right now,” said housing authority director Bob Havlicek. “Even if we did have extra vouchers available, then its public policy issue of ‘why are you helping these folks if you have people on your waitlist?’ We can’t win either way.”

There isn’t much optimism from advocates that the state will step up once the emergency funds run dry.

Bond funds that the state has used to prop up much of its affordable housing spending are running low, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposed budget for the coming fiscal year includes little extra and rental subsidies, a costly and ongoing expense, have historically been a federal responsibility anyway.

That leaves the federal government, which does not appear to be in a big spending mood when it comes to social programs.

On Monday, Trump signed a budget bill to continue funding the federal government at levels set last year. That may provide a steady funding source for the overall federal housing voucher program, though the bill may give his administration flexibility to redirect some of those funds if it chooses to. It does nothing to address the fate of the Emergency Housing Voucher program.

“We should figure out a way to save this program and make sure these people continue to receive federal rental assistance,” said Tushar Gurjal, a policy analyst at the National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials, which lobbies Congress on behalf of affordable housing providers. “None of these folks did anything wrong. They’re just using their vouchers and following all the rules.”

In an attempt to resolve evictions before they go to trial, the Los Angeles County Superior Court has launched new programs that seek to facilitate settlements by providing free attorneys to tenants and financial relief to landlords who are owed back rent.

Presiding Judge Sergio Tapia said these pilot programs are designed to stem the tide of evictions, which have risen sharply since the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We're trying to show litigants across the board, whether it’s tenants or landlords, that the court is the opportunity to try to find resolution faster,” Tapia told LAist.

Both tenant and landlord attorneys agree that settlements can often be the best path for both parties.

One program launched last month in downtown L.A.’s Stanley Mosk Courthouse gives tenants the right to request a mandatory settlement conference overseen by a court-appointed settlement officer.

These tenants, who rarely come to court with legal representation, will be given a free attorney to guide them though the settlement conferences, as long as they earn less than 125% of the federal poverty level.

But lawyers who represent landlords say their clients often feel local government is increasingly putting money toward helping renters, while leaving property owners struggling.

Where does funding come from?

Facing eviction without a lawyer “puts people at such an enormous disadvantage, when landlords normally have lawyers,” said Conway Collis, president of the Mayor’s Fund for Los Angeles, a nonprofit that is helping to fund the Mosk program’s free attorneys.

Other funding comes from Stay Housed L.A., a legal aid partnership funded by the county of L.A. and the city of L.A. through its “mansion tax.”

Landlords will be required to notify tenants about the program in the eviction paperwork they serve to tenants.

Settlement officers come from the court’s pool of temporary judges, who handle lower-level cases, such as traffic infractions. Other officers are retired judges or trained lawyers.

The settlement conferences are being held on the same day as regularly scheduled court hearings, one floor down from the Mosk courthouse’s eviction department.

How are the conferences working so far?

Elena Popp, the executive director of the Eviction Defense Network, which is providing lawyers for the program, said that on one recent day, landlords and tenants were able to reach mutually agreeable settlements in about half the conferences.

“We settled one,” Popp said. “We are very close to settling a second one. The other two are way further apart because the tenant really wants to stay on, but the landlord really wants them to go.”

Settlement deals look different in each case, Popp said. Sometimes they involve landlords letting tenants stay if they pay overdue rent. In other cases, tenants are given additional time to find new housing before they must leave. When settlements are reached, cases are sealed so that evictions won’t be visible on a tenant’s record, a black mark that makes it very difficult to find new housing.

When settlements can’t be reached, landlords and tenants go back upstairs to resume their normal proceedings, Popp said.

No matter how cases are resolved, she said, tenants can’t be expected to navigate legally complex processes on their own.

“One of the things that we stressed when we were setting this up is that you absolutely have to have a lawyer,” Popp said.

Compton program pairs settlements with money to landlords

Another pilot program launched last month at the Compton courthouse offers up to $10,000 to cover rent owed to landlords in cases that settle. Landlords will be required to inform tenants about the settlement conferences. To qualify, either the tenant or the landlord must earn no more than 120% of the area’s median income.

The settlement conferences at the Compton courthouse are overseen by Community Legal Aid of Southern California, and rent relief funding is administered by L.A. County’s Department of Consumer and Business Affairs.

Attorney Aaron Kohanim, who represents landlords, said he advises his clients to settle whenever possible, because going to trial is “a casino — you don't know if you're going to win.”

But he also said landlords generally view taxpayer-funded attorneys for tenants as unfair.

“Only one side gets a piece of that pot,” Kohanim said. “Landlords have to pay out of pocket for their attorneys. And on top of that, they are not allowed to collect rent in the middle of the case, so they're getting beaten by two different angles, versus a tenant who is just living there rent-free and they get a free lawyer.”

Tapia said the programs are currently limited to the Mosk and Compton courthouses because of funding constraints and limited resources. But the judge said if they prove successful, they could be expanded county-wide.

“If we're able to show success, that will allow us to recruit a more robust set of settlement officers to perhaps expand,” Tapia said. “We need to see how this pilot plays out first.”

Electric vehicle batteries are a lot like people, in one important respect: They're most comfortable in temperatures around 65 to 75 degrees Fahrenheit.

When the weather gets much colder or hotter than that, a battery works less efficiently. It has to work harder, too, to keep the vehicle's cabin comfortable for its equally picky human occupants.

The result? Electric vehicles can't drive as far or as efficiently in extremely hot or cold weather.

AAA has been testing exactly how big an effect temperatures have on modern EV batteries. In its latest research, shared exclusively with NPR, it found that hot temperatures reduced range by an average of 8.5%. Cold weather cut vehicles' range by a whopping 39%.

AAA ran similar tests back in 2019 with a different vehicle lineup. Back then, the cold weather hit to range was approximately the same, while the high-temperature range loss was higher, 17%. The different slate of vehicles complicates direct comparison, AAA warns, but does suggest some improvements in how EVs handle the heat.

But not the cold. "There's been a lot of technology changes," says Greg Brannon, the director of automotive engineering at AAA. New battery chemistries; more efficient EV designs; fancier software. But when it comes to winter range performance, "the electric vehicles actually didn't change all that much from back in 2019."

Greg Brannon, the director of automotive engineering at AAA, at the Automotive Research Center in Los Angeles.

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These results show that drivers need to be prepared for their real-world range to shrink in the winter — and to a lesser extent, at the height of summer. EVs can still be practical choices in hotter or colder climates, as long as drivers adjust for predictable range loss. "It can be overcome," says Brannon. "But you have to plan for it."

A treadmill in a freezer

AAA conducts these tests at its own expense, part of a slate of research the group does into emerging vehicle technology for the benefit of auto club members. The tests are carried out at its Automotive Research Center in Los Angeles. Specifically, inside the historic headquarters of the Automobile Club of Southern California: a Spanish Revival-style building, all stucco and red tiles, built around a century-old Moreton Bay fig tree, with a courtyard filled with oranges, palm trees and fountains.

It's possibly the most picturesque place for a California driver to get a smog check. (Yes, AAA offers that here.) But it's not, at first glance, a likely spot for testing how vehicles perform in extreme temperatures, especially not on an April day in the mid-60s. (The locals complained about it as "jacket weather.")

The Automotive Research Center in Los Angeles, located inside the historic headquarters of the Automobile Club of Southern California.

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But tucked away inside this building is a room that's heavily insulated and packed with powerful heaters and coolers. It can be cranked down to 20 degrees Fahrenheit, or up to 95.

Inside, there's enough space for a single vehicle, parked very carefully on top of two giant steel rollers — each of them 4 feet in diameter — that are hidden beneath floor level.

This is a chassis dynamometer, or "dyno" for short. "For lack of a better term, I guess it's kind of like a treadmill for a car," says Megan McKernan, who manages the research center.

For each test, the two rollers are carefully positioned to match up with the wheels of the test vehicle. Then the car is driven right on top of them, making sure the wheels touch nothing else. The vehicle is tied down with heavy, bright-pink chains, so it can't move forward off the "treadmill."

A test vehicle is positioned on a chassis dynamometer. "For lack of a better term, I guess it's kind of like a treadmill for a car," says Megan McKernan.

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Now, it's time for Richard Gonzalez to "drive" the vehicle — without actually going anywhere. Once he gets inside and presses the accelerator, the wheels make those giant rollers turn. For hours.

This is about as fun as it sounds. Gonzalez much prefers other parts of his job, like track tests, where AAA evaluates how well cars can, say, automatically brake to avoid pedestrians. But podcasts help pass the time.

The point is to see how far the battery can go, under these controlled conditions, at a certain temperature.

Once the car's battery is drained so much that it can't maintain highway speeds, the test is over. And AAA has a new data point showing how well a certain model's battery can take cold or heat.

A small hit in the summer, a big one in the winter

EVs are not the only kinds of cars that suffer in the cold. AAA also tested hybrids this time around and found a nearly 23% average loss in fuel economy in the 20 degrees F test.

"Internal combustion engine vehicles also lose range in extreme cold weather," points out Ed Kim, the chief analyst with the research group AutoPacific, who was not involved in AAA's research. The Environmental Protection Agency has estimated a 10% to 30% drop in gas vehicle fuel economy in cold weather, depending on the type of trip. "This isn't a problem that's exclusive to EVs. This happens to basically any kind of vehicle when it gets really cold."

In some colder parts of the world, EVs have already become dominant, despite the challenge of winter range loss. Norway has the highest rate of EV adoption in the world — 98% pure battery-electric in March 2026, according to the latest numbers. And Norway is hardly balmy.

Electric vehicles are parked in Geiranger, Norway. The country has the highest rate of EV adoption in the world.

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But in the U.S., it's a different story. Kim says that EVs have taken off much more in states where temperatures are warm or mild than in the chilly Midwest. State policies and charger availability also play a role, but Kim says fears about winter range — both valid concerns and misinformation-fueled myths — are a factor.

Still, Kim says even with a significant amount of range loss, many drivers in cold-weather regions would still find an EV more than sufficient for their daily needs. "How many people are actually driving more than 200 miles in a day?" he asks rhetorically.

Tips for getting the most from a battery, year-round. 

Range loss from extreme temperatures is inevitable, but EV drivers can prepare for it.

First, pick the right vehicle to battle the temperatures where you live. Some are better than others at handling cold or heat. There are several guides; the most fun comes from a Norwegian auto club that does a head-to-head test every year on a wintry mountain.

A little forward planning helps, too, Kim and Brannon both say. For an EV driver who charges at home overnight and has a typical commute, reduced winter range likely won't affect daily driving at all. But if you don't have a home charger or you're going on a long trip, factor range reduction in when you think about when and where you'll charge. And if you're fast-charging, try to do it on a battery that's been warmed up; charging is slower on a cold battery.

Brannon also recommends that drivers start their climate control while their vehicle is still plugged in. "Pre-conditioning" like that means that when you warm up the car's battery and its interior, you pull power from the grid, not your battery. That saves your vehicle's juice for your drive.

McKernan notes that if you have heated or ventilated seats, using those instead of the air conditioning or heater can be a big boost. The AC and heat are a surprisingly big draw on a vehicle's energy.

And keep your tires inflated to the manufacturer-recommended level and drive at moderate speeds. That boosts your vehicle's efficiency no matter whether it runs on gas, a giant battery or both — and no matter the temperature.
Copyright 2026 NPR

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

While deciphering posted parking regulations around L.A. lately, you may have noticed new signs.

“This property is owned or controlled by the city of Los Angeles,” the shiny red-and-white placards say. "It may only be used for its intended purpose and not used for immigration enforcement as a staging area, processing location, or operations base.”

The LA Local recently spotted them at Hollenbeck Park’s parking lot and at various parking lots close to Echo Park. The mayor’s office told The LA Local the city has installed 500 of them at various locations, including at MacArthur Park, Lafayette Park, the Los Angeles Zoo and Metrolink stations.

The city has received no reports that agents have used the city-owned spaces since the signs were installed. A spokesperson for the mayor’s office said that the city could sue for a restraining order if federal agencies violate the prohibition.

Why were the signs posted?

Mayor Karen Bass ordered that these signs be posted on all city-owned property in February as part of her Executive Order 17. A spokesperson for the mayor’s office said they placed the signs in locations “identified as more likely to be used for [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] operational activity.”

Since the federal government began sweeping operations in Los Angeles last year, immigration advocates and community members have called for the city to do more to keep immigrant residents safer.

In response, Bass issued Executive Order 17, saying the “City must and can do more to protect our City and all who live, work and visit the City of Angels.”

A sign at MacArthur Park prohibits federal agents from using city-owned property to stage for immigration enforcement operations.

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How have federal immigration operations involved city property and employees?

In July 2025, about 100 federal agents conducted an operation in MacArthur Park. Days later, Bass issued a separate executive order clarifying the city’s property and resources could not be used for federal immigration enforcement. 

Meanwhile, LAPD Police Chief Jim McDonnell has made repeated statements that he doesn’t agree with or plan to enforce various state laws requiring federal agents to identify themselves and do their work without a mask. (After the Trump administration filed lawsuits, courts have blocked various provisions of those state laws in court anyway.)

Some advocates and Angelenos have called on LAPD to draw a clearer line between the local policing work they are responsible for and the immigration enforcement federal agents do.

Bass’ February order requiring the signs be installed came soon after.

The city has also prohibited its employees from working second jobs with federal immigration enforcement.

What else does Executive Order 17 do?

The order states that unless federal agents have a warrant or court order, they are not allowed to use city-owned or operated property to stage for operations. It also requires LAPD officers to identify federal agents and record their interactions with them. The police commission has since started to publicly report basic details about those interactions.

What happens if federal agents use the city spaces anyway?

The order does not establish what penalties federal agents could face if they are found to be using city property for staging. A spokesperson for the mayor’s office said that the city could sue or pursue a restraining order if federal agencies violate the prohibition.

“Any necessary response will be handled in accordance with the Executive Order and applicable City protocols,” the city statement said.