In mid-March of this year, the Los Angeles City Council voted on a $177 million budget to continue to fund a homeless prevention program in Los Angeles County. This funding, however, has not hit the accounts of the nonprofit organization that help struggling tenants across the city

Stay Housed L.A. is a legal resource program formed in 2020 to address the effects of the COVID-19 housing crisis. They partner with the City of Los Angeles and LA County to offer an array of tailored legal and social services aimed to assist tenants at risk of eviction and other housing crises. These organizations claim that hundreds of tenants are at risk of losing access to eviction services each month the contract isn’t finalized.

Despite the approval from Mayor Karen Bass and the overwhelming support from the council, which includes LA Mayoral Candidate Nithya Raman, the funding has yet to hit Stay Housed L.A. This means that sooner rather than later, existing funding will run dry and the ample services provided will be significantly cut.

“The Los Angeles Housing Department has reached out and worked with Stay Housed LA and the partner organizations as well as the Office of the City Attorney, and we do believe that the contracts are in the final review stages after which the contracts will be executed,” Sharon Sandow, director of communications and
external affairs at the Los Angeles Housing Department said in a statement. “We are hopeful this will happen very soon.”

City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto has quietly expressed her concerns about the budget, particularly the $106 million allocated to the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, which routinely sues the city. It is not the first time that Soto has put up a fight against the LAFLA, as she audited the organization in June of last year. A meeting was held to discuss the audit the following August, but there are no further reported updates.

Barbara J. Schultz is the Director of Housing Justice at LAFLA. She states that LAFLA and their subcontractors have worked three months without funding, and layoffs and furloughs are beginning to occur.

“We still don’t have an executed contract, we haven’t quite finalized those terms. We are very concerned about the potential reductions in service,” Schultz said in an interview with Los Angeles. “I have several subcontractors who are quite small organizations and their primary source of funding is this contract. So for them, they can’t hold on much longer.”

That said, Schultz added that some progress has been made.

“In the last week, we’ve gotten some movement. We got two different contract versions from the city attorney’s office, and we did have a helpful meeting,” Schultz said.

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A motion filed by Councilmember Ysabel Jurado questioned why the $177 million in emergency funding was sitting unused as eviction threats loomed over affected Los Angeles County residents. Jurado reaffirmed that Stay Housed L.A. has continued to offer legal aid services during the wait, but will have to make changes if the funding does not reach them soon.

There is currently no vote scheduled to address Jurado’s motion.

Feldstein Soto has had a wildly unpopular time in office, and now sits in third place for re-election. Unfortunately, due to her time coming to a close, the contract to fund the legal aid organizations may be put off further than originally anticipated.

“Every day we go without a contract, meaning that we have no hope of getting paid for the work we are doing, another contractor is going to feel like they can’t do this any longer,” Schultz said.