Homeless shelter in Highland Park gets city funding to stay open during El Niño

The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday approved $20,000 to keep a Highland Park homeless shelter open during looming El Niño rains, as advocates called on the city to pledge $100 million a year to fund longer-term solutions.

The city has been under fire for delaying action to safeguard the estimated 18,000 people who live on the streets as the potentially disastrous storms approach. Mayor Eric Garcetti put off declaring a state of emergency, which officials had hoped would bring in state or federal disaster funds for homeless aid.

Stung by skyrocketing rents and an influx of homeless people pushed out of downtown, northeast Los Angeles is among the hardest-hit communities in the current crisis. Unlike skid row, the neighborhood has no shelter and few resources for the estimated 800 residents who sleep in their vehicles or on the streets.

The Highland Park shelter, run by volunteers at All Saints’ Episcopal Church, opened Dec. 1 without city funding or permission, providing bedding for homeless people to sleep in the pews.

The city subsequently pledged $75,000 to the church shelter, but organizer Monica Alcaraz said the funding was threatened by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, which said the pews were too narrow and people sleeping on them could fall.

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A potential rift opened between Gil Cedillo and Jose Huizar, the two councilmen who represent Highland Park. Cedillo proposed opening a vacant armory in Huizar’s district as a temporary shelter. Huizar countered that it would take years and millions of dollars to make the armory safe and habitable, and moved instead to give $20,000 from his council fund to the church shelter, which is in Cedillo’s district.

In the end, the council unanimously supported the shelter funding and referred the armory motion to the homelessness committee. Huizar’s staff said the homeless authority has agreed to a funding waiver to aid the church shelter.

Rebecca Prine, director of Recycled Resources for the Homeless, which runs the church shelter, said she was “in complete awe and gratitude for our neighbors experiencing homelessness.”

Meanwhile, representatives of several social service agencies converged on City Hall on Wednesday to make final appeals before release of the city’s homelessness plan, which is due in mid-January.

The $100-million funding commitment is the key issue in the public debate over the plan, which will be released in conjunction with Los Angeles County’s homelessness blueprint.

City leaders in September pledged to spend up to $100 million to attack the crisis, but so far have allocated $12.4 million in emergency relief. Homeless service providers say the city must spend $100 million every year to address a rolling disaster that the city let fester for decades.

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Ann-Sophie Morrissette, director of policy at the Downtown Women’s Center, said, “$20,000 here, $20,000 there isn’t enough money. We’re asking that $100 million a year be a permanent commitment.”

“There’s no quick hit getting out of this,” said Chris Ko, a director at United Way of Greater Los Angeles’ Home for Good project.

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Twitter: @geholland

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