Los Angeles homeless population increases for first time in two years
The effort to curtail the homelessness crisis in Los Angeles suffered a setback, with the number of unsheltered residents increasing in 2026 after declining over the past two years.
After decreasing 14% since 2023, a source close to the mayor told CBS News Los Angeles that the homeless population in the city increased 3.4% compared to last year. Unsheltered homelessness, people living in campers, cars and RVs, also increased by 7.9% in 2026, according to the source.
"For two years straight, we drove down homelessness by historic margins — but as expected, last year our efforts ultimately couldn't keep up with policies and funding cuts at the federal and state levels that pushed more people onto the streets," Bass said in a statement.
During its annual homeless count in 2025, the LA Homeless Services Authority said volunteers recorded 72,308 homeless people in the county, 43,669 of whom lived in the city. This marked a 3.4% drop in unsheltered residents living in the city of LA compared to 2024.
Former LA City Councilman Mike Bonin, now the executive director of Cal State LA's Institute for Public Affairs, criticized the annual homeless counts and their credibility.
"My first take on the homelessness count numbers is that, generally speaking, they're not the most credible numbers in the world," Bonin said. "It's a useful tool for allocating funding, to give you a sense of where people are, but it is mainly, for good or for bad, being used as a tool in political debate, as we're seeing right now. It's become an issue in the mayor's race."
Bass defended her efforts to combat the crisis, saying that her office has helped 85,000 people avoid eviction and moved tens of thousands of people into interim housing.
She attributed the increase in homelessness to a 50% cut to state funding, which stripped the city of $70 million, and the Trump administration inflating the cost of living.
"The Trump Administration has driven up the cost of gas, groceries, and rent — pushing more families to the edge — and slashed critical safety net funding," she said in a statement. "And, last year's 50% cut in state HHAP funding from $1 billion to $500 million — resulting in a $70 million hit to L.A. city alone — severely impacted our work to keep people housed and get more Angelenos off the streets."
The mayor proposed the city shift away from LAHSA after audits in 2024 and 2025 uncovered severe accounting concerns at the joint city-county program.
"For thirty years, this city has run its homeless response through LAHSA — and audits and the courts have now made plain what too many Angelenos already saw: the money wasn't tracked, providers went unpaid, and public trust eroded," Bass said in the statement.
Following the audits, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development pulled federal funding for the organization in June 2026 after investigators claimed the local agency "abused hundreds of millions of tax dollars per year."
In a letter to LAHSA executives, HUD staff said they "uncovered evidence" that LAHSA lacked financial management, internal controls and safeguards against conflicts of interest for the $944 million it has received since 2021.
"I'm not going to defend a broken system," Bass said. "The City must build something better — results-driven, transparent, and centered around the people we're trying to help, not the bureaucracy."
LAHSA is expected to release the full report on homelessness in the county on Friday.
