CalMatters sues LA homeless authority to obtain secret shelter records

A string of sexual assaults in Los Angeles shelters. A brutal murder in a motel transformed into emergency pandemic housing. Rats, roaches and garbage piling up in supposed safe havens.

What else is happening inside homeless shelters in California’s biggest city?

CalMatters filed a lawsuit last week to find out, after the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority repeatedly denied our attempts to inspect shelter incident reports under California’s Public Records Act. The law allows the public broad access to governmental records.

For eight months, CalMatters has sought to obtain the incident reports, which track major events at publicly funded shelters. Contractors hired to operate the facilities are supposed to use the reports to quickly document serious issues including deaths, contagious disease, suspected abuse and overdoses, according to the agency’s own website.

The agency has said that the reports fall under “attorney-client privilege” and are therefore exempt from the public records law. However, reports are typically created by contractors, not attorneys. CalMatters and its attorneys at Covington & Burling repeatedly asked for evidence that the reports are communicated to attorneys; the agency did not provide it.

To justify its claim, the agency cited a 1995 court ruling in City of Hemet v. Superior Court. The court ruled that police records could be kept secret to protect the privacy of police officers. LAHSA does not employ any police officers.

“Therefore, it is unclear how the authority can claim that these records are exempt to protect the privacy of police officers,” the lawsuit states. Additionally, the Hemet case “makes clear that exempting (that is, hiding) large categories of public documents which happened to become ‘relevant’ to later litigation” is contrary to the Public Records Act, according to the suit.

The new CalMatters lawsuit comes amid a bigger reckoning over homelessness in the nation’s most populous state. California has spent more than $24 billion to address the issue over the past five years, a state audit found, only to fail to track most of the results.

Scarce shelter beds are often the most immediate alternative to the street, but CalMatters has revealed concerns about abuses inside shelters and failing state efforts to monitor them. Whether cities can move more people into shelters is an increasingly urgent question, after the U.S. Supreme Court granted cities more power to ban sleeping outside.

The state of California does not maintain any central list of homeless shelters, let alone regularly track issues like deaths or violence, leaving most oversight to local agencies like LAHSA.

“What happens in shelters remains largely a ‘black box,’” the lawsuit states. “Because of the lack of public access to homeless shelters, CalMatters relies extensively on public records for its investigative reporting on this topic of immense public concern.”

Covington & Burling represent CalMatters pro-bono through the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.

L.A. has long been home to the nation’s second-largest homeless population after New York City. Officials recently touted a slight decrease in the number of homeless people tallied in annual one-night counts — some 75,312 people across L.A. County — amid aggressive efforts to clear encampments and move people inside.

LAHSA, like other homeless services agencies, has come under fire for past reports of shelter hazards like bed bugs, mold, harassment and poor medical care. While Gov. Gavin Newsom and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass spar over the best path forward on homelessness, advocates and officials at other public agencies are also asking for more transparency and accountability.

The L.A. Controller’s Office recently launched a fraud investigation into a shelter contractor that was being paid a reported $110 per person per day to feed homeless residents, only to offer “almost entirely” instant noodles. In June, homeless advocates sent Bass an open letter over a lack of resources for homeless women, citing “unsanitary, unsafe and poorly staffed” shelters.

“Inadequate shelter and services discourages unhoused people from accepting or remaining in shelter,” City Controller Kenneth Mejia said in a statement. “LA cannot meaningfully lower our unhoused population unless the city provides adequate housing and services.”