Head of LA homeless services resigns days after county votes to pull $350M from troubled agency

After a bruising week that saw the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority lose a large chunk of its funding, the agency’s head announced Friday she will be stepping down.

Va Lecia Adams Kellum, who joined as the agency’s chief executive two years ago from L.A. Mayor Karen Bass’ administration, had been fighting to preserve funding from L.A. County.

But earlier this week, county leaders voted to strip the agency’s funding in favor of channeling resources through a new county department they said would provide more oversight and accountability.

The county is currently the agency's largest funder, providing nearly $350 million a year. LAHSA’s next largest funder is the city of L.A., and city officials are also exploring an exit from funding the agency.

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In recent months, multiple audits have found serious accounting and oversight issues at the agency. The most recent audit, released in March in connection with a lawsuit brought against the city and county of L.A., prompted U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter to describe officials’ failure to track billions of dollars in spending as “a slow train wreck.”

Why now?

In a resignation letter submitted Friday, and first reported by the L.A. Times, Adams Kellum wrote that she was proud of her efforts to make the agency more effective. She noted that unsheltered homelessness in the region decreased last year in the count her agency oversaw, and was expected to decrease again this year based on partial results released earlier than usual.

Still, Adams Kellum said, now was the right time to step down.

“Ensuring a seamless handover is a top priority, and I am committed to a 120-day transition period, or longer if needed,” she wrote.

Adams Kellum joined LAHSA as CEO in January 2023. Prior to stepping into local government, she was the CEO of St. Joseph Center, a homeless services provider based in Venice.

The exit comes after LAist revealed in February that as LAHSA’s CEO, Adams Kellum signed a taxpayer deal to pay $2.1 million to a nonprofit that employs her husband in a senior leadership role. Adams Kellum had previously told LAist she followed rules barring her from any matters that involve the group. Public documents LAist reviewed showed otherwise.

Officials' positions on LAHSA

The L.A. City Council is also considering a proposal to pull the city’s funding from the agency. Currently, the city contributes about $306 million to the agency’s annual budget.

Bass and some City Council members have said the agency’s performance has been improving and that now is not the right time to withdraw funding.

Bass issued a statement Friday thanking Adams Kellum and calling her an "agent of change."

"Dr. Adams Kellum has saved thousands of lives in Los Angeles. ... She tackled the challenges of the homelessness system — silos, services, accountability, cost — and despite knowing that LAHSA was broken, she answered the call of service to serve as CEO because she knows that above all else, we must work to save lives," the mayor said.

Councilmember Nithya Raman, chair of the council's housing and homelessness committee, said the city was "finally making headway against our most intractable crisis."

"I deeply hope that this momentum won't be lost, because it would be the most vulnerable people — those on our streets — who would suffer,” Raman said in a written statement.

Other elected leaders have said that under Adams Kellum’s watch, the agency has not been able to say what local taxpayers are getting in exchange for their money. Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, one of City Hall’s most outspoken critics of the agency, has said she feels the current funding model “has zero transparency, zero consequences for failure to perform.”

L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, one of the leaders of the move to pull the county's funding from LAHSA, said Friday that change is what's needed.

"LAHSA has seen multiple leadership transitions during challenging times," Horvath said in a statement. She added: "To truly move forward, we must replace this broken system with the accountability measures that set future leaders up for success."

What's next

Recent turmoil leaves the agency’s role uncertain.

Elected leaders agree that even if most of its funding is pulled, the agency will still perform certain key functions, like overseeing the region’s annual homeless count and coordinating shared data on homeless services.

But without being entrusted with hundreds of millions of dollars each year for service providers, shelters and outreach efforts, the agency would have a much diminished role in confronting the region’s homelessness crisis. Hundreds of LAHSA employees will likely have to leave the agency.

Read the resignation letter

How we're reporting on this

Reporters Nick Gerda and David Wagner are working on this developing story. In all cases, we strive to bring you the most accurate information in real time and will update this story as new information becomes available.

More LAHSA reporting from LAist

• LA County to strip hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars from homelessness agency
• Judge blasts LA homeless spending as a ‘train wreck’ and threatens to seize control
• LA County supervisors to vote on pulling over $300 million out of homeless services agency
• LA's top homelessness official signed $2.1 million contract with husband's employer