{"id":424399,"date":"2026-08-05T10:52:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T10:52:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/424399\/"},"modified":"2026-08-05T10:52:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T10:52:08","slug":"la-metro-homelessness-falls-57-since-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/424399\/","title":{"rendered":"LA Metro Homelessness Falls 57% Since 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

The number of people experiencing homelessness on the Los Angeles Metro transit system has dropped 57% since 2024, transit officials announced Monday, marking a second consecutive year of steep declines that the agency credits to a public safety approach pairing outreach services with law enforcement.<\/p>\n

The 2026 point-in-time count found 31% fewer unhoused people on the system than a year earlier. This year’s tally estimated 395 to 517 people experiencing homelessness<\/a> on Metro, down from 631 to 684 in 2025 and 1,041 to 1,092 in 2024. Because the count is not an exact census, results are reported as a range to account for statistical margins of error.<\/p>\n

Metro attributes the progress to what it calls an integrated public safety model, which combines care-based services with coordinated law enforcement and security. In January, the agency’s Department of Public Safety launched a Care-Based Services Division that brought Metro Ambassadors, the Homeless Outreach Management and Engagement program, and Community Intervention Specialists together under one umbrella.<\/p>\n

“This continued decline reflects the dedication of Metro employees and our many partners who work every day to address homelessness with compassion, accountability and coordination,” Metro CEO Stephanie Wiggins said. “These results show that our model is making a real difference \u2014 for people experiencing homelessness and for the tens of thousands of customers who rely on Metro every day.”<\/p>\n

Metro Board Chair and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass tied the gains to policies adopted during her tenure. “During and after the COVID-19 pandemic, many more unhoused people began to populate our Metro system,” Bass said. “We combined compassionate outreach with enhanced public safety strategies to get people housed with the services they need. These results prove that our approach is working and these efforts must continue.”<\/p>\n

The agency said its results depend on collaboration with the Los Angeles County Department of Homeless Services & Housing, the city and county of Los Angeles, and community-based organizations that provide outreach, interim housing and permanent housing placement. In fiscal year 2026, Metro’s outreach teams connected 354 individuals to permanent housing.<\/p>\n

The transit count was conducted Jan. 20 as part of the broader Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count led by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority<\/a>. Sixty-two volunteers, including outreach workers, Metro employees and riders, surveyed the rail and busway system in a single evening, focusing on stations, rights-of-way and parking lots. The methodology matches the countywide effort and aligns with U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development standards, though the Metro-specific figures were not included in LAHSA’s published regional total.<\/p>\n

Metro carries nearly 1 million boardings daily across a fleet of 2,200 buses and six rail lines. The agency said its April 2026 customer satisfaction survey found approval had risen to 87%.<\/p>\n

The transit improvements run counter to the broader regional picture. LAHSA’s 2026 count found homelessness across the county rose 1.2%, to an estimated 73,040 people, and climbed 3.4% within the city of Los Angeles, to about 45,194 \u2014 reversing two consecutive years of declines. Unsheltered homelessness in the city jumped 7.9%.<\/p>\n

LAHSA attributed the regional increase largely to a funding-driven pause in a flexible rental assistance program, which slowed movement through the rehousing system. Interim chief executive Gita O’Neill said access to permanent housing remains the decisive factor. “When our unhoused neighbors lost access to rental subsidies, the system slowed, there was less upward movement in interim housing, and progress stalled,” she said.<\/p>\n

Bass offered a different emphasis on the regional reversal, attributing it to federal policy under the Trump administration and to what she described as a 50% cut in state Homeless Housing, Assistance and Prevention funding, from $1 billion to $500 million, which she said cost the city of Los Angeles $70 million.<\/p>\n

LAHSA also cited economic pressure, noting that a Los Angeles County household must earn $110,000 a year to afford the average rent of $2,745 a month, and that the region lacks more than 473,000 affordable homes it needs.<\/p>\n

The counting methodology has faced scrutiny. A RAND Corporation study published in 2025 found LAHSA’s volunteer-led count has significantly undercounted the region’s unsheltered population in recent years, and a HUD-mandated review of the 2025 count identified duplication and utilization errors that prompted revisions. LAHSA has also weathered a forensic audit, the loss of roughly $350 million in annual county funding and the resignation of its former chief executive over the past year.<\/p>\n

Officials describe the point-in-time count as a directional indicator rather than a census, cautioning that year-over-year changes should be read alongside other local data.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The number of people experiencing homelessness on the Los Angeles Metro transit system has dropped 57% since 2024,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":424400,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[48,52,51,47,50,49],"class_list":["post-424399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=424399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424399\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/424400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=424399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=424399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=424399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}