Overview > Background

Background

Bring LA Home, The Partnership to End Homelessness, is a comprehensive and focused effort by the Los Angeles community with the goal of ending homelessness in LA County by the year 2013. Convened by elected officials from across Los Angeles County, Bring LA Home is a panel of more than 50 leaders of government, faith-based, social service, advocacy, entertainment, law enforcement, and business organizations, and people who have experienced homelessness.

Bring LA Home will guide and lead the planning process with coordination from the unique partnership of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) and the Los Angeles Coalition to End Hunger & Homelessness (LACEH&H). The objective is to create and implement a realistic, workable and widely accepted plan with the goal to end homelessness in Los Angeles County. The design of the plan will take approximately one year. Implementation will begin thereafter with the goal to end homelessness within a decade.

The crisis of homelessness in Los Angeles is not limited to pockets of concentration in a few areas. While homeless people may be most obvious in places like Downtown’s “Skid Row,” it is a crisis that truly confronts every neighborhood from the beaches of Santa Monica and Long Beach to the suburban valleys.

On average, 84,000 people in Los Angeles County on any given night, and more than 236,000 are homeless at some point during the course of a single year. This means that approximately one person in 100 in Los Angeles County goes to sleep without a home every night. Stated another way, if consolidated in one community, those 84,000 would comprise the 17th largest municipality in Los Angeles County.

As other communities across the country have joined in the national movement to address this crisis, LAHSA and LACEH&H embarked on a strategy to combine and focus the efforts of all entities that deal with and are affected by homelessness. This effort and partnership has been praised by officials in Washington, DC as a model for the rest of the nation. Bring LA Home is supported by the consulting team of the Economic Roundtable and the Institute for the Study of Poverty and Homelessness at the Weingart Center.

By sitting down at one table and setting aside differences, Bring LA Home will embody the public’s commitment to reach the goal of ending homelessness within a decade. The panel is expected to convene four times over the course of a year. During that time, the consultants and other experts will estimate the prevalence and characteristics of homelessness across the county. They bring together people who have experienced homelessness, service providers and the public together and will gather their knowledge and advice. The panel members will be provided with a comprehensive base of knowledge to help them design the best approaches and solutions to plot a course that will lead to the goal to end homelessness in Los Angeles County in ten years.

Common Questions

What Is Bring LA Home?
It is a partnership of more than 50 leaders who are all committed to creating a plan with the goal to end homelessness in Los Angeles County in 10 years.

Who’s convening this effort?
The convening committee includes Los Angeles Mayor Jim Hahn, LA County Supervisors Yvonne Brathwaite Burke and Zev Yaroslavsky, Los Angeles County Sheriff Leroy Baca, Pasadena Mayor Bill Bogaard, Santa Monica Mayor Richard Bloom, Long Beach Mayor Beverly O’Neill and L.A. City Councilmembers Jan Perry, Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti.

Who is coordinating this effort?
Bring LA Home is coordinated by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority and the Los Angeles Coalition to End Hunger & Homelessness, and is supported by the consulting team of the Economic Roundtable and the Institute for the Study of Poverty and Homelessness at the Weingart Center.

How many homeless people are there?
A previous study estimated that 84,000 people in Los Angeles County were homeless on any given night. That is about 1% of the population.

How big is this crisis?
If consolidated in one community, the men, women and children of Los Angeles County who experience homelessness nightly would comprise the 17th largest municipality in the county.

Where are homeless people currently?
Homeless people live in every community in the county, not just in concentrated areas like “Skid Row.” They live in shelters and cars, under bridges and freeway underpasses, in alleys and parks and on beaches and city streets.

How broad is this effort? Why is this different?
This is the largest and broadest effort ever attempted in our community. Bring LA Home features homeless advocates, social service providers and experts, as well as leaders from government, major corporations, faith-based institutions, law enforcement, philanthropic organizations and academia who will build upon existing efforts and bring fresh ideas and approaches to the table. The panel also includes people who have experienced homelessness or are presently homeless.