A federal court hearing is expected to resume Friday to determine whether the city of Los Angeles has breached its agreement to significantly reduce homeless encampments and produce a plan for the creation of an additional 3,800 shelter beds required within the next two years.
As a remedy, U.S. District Judge David Carter in downtown Los Angeles could appoint a receiver to monitor the city’s homelessness response.
The L.A. Alliance for Human Rights, a group of business owners and local residents, filed a complaint in March 2020 against the city and Los Angeles County accusing them of not doing enough to address the availability and access to shelter for the homeless.
A judge signed off on a settlement in September 2023 that the county agreed to supply an additional 3,000 beds for mental and substance abuse treatment for the end of 2026 and 450 new subsidies for board-and-care beds.
“The new resources come on top of $293 million the county pledged in a separate agreement over the course of this three-and-a-half-year lawsuit to provide 6,700 beds for people experiencing homelessness near freeways as well as for unhoused seniors,” a statement by the coalition read in 2023.
An audit in March 2025 was unable to verify the number of homeless shelter beds the city claims to have created. According to the L.A. Alliance, the audit revealed Los Angeles’ homeless response to be burdened with antiquated systems, obsolete data infrastructure, contracts lacking accountability and leadership either unwilling or unable to correct course.
The settlement agreement requires the city to produce of 12,915 shelter beds by June 2027. There are still over 3,800 beds to be created, court papers show.
The plaintiffs want Carter to find that the city is not complying with its agreement, and wants the judge to appoint a receiver. The city of Los Angeles strenuously opposes the appointment.
The settlement agreement, in part, required the city to provide milestones and deadlines for “encampment engagement, cleaning, and reduction” in each council district and citywide, and required the city to “employ its best efforts to comply with established plans, milestones, and deadlines.”
According to the L.A. Alliance, the city first reported there were 2,137 encampment reductions in a three-month period in 2024. The figure was found to be incorrect, and the city subsequently reported only 1,688 reductions in a six-month period.
The L.A. Alliance alleges the city does not appear to have an accurate number of encampment reductions, and is mischaracterizing clean-ups as “encampment resolutions.”
The judge has stated he agrees with the L.A. Alliance that cleaning an area, only to have unhoused individuals move back in without offers of shelter or housing, is not a “resolution” or encampment “reduction” and should not be reported as such.
The city was ordered to only report encampment reductions that have a more permanent meaning and in which homeless people are moved off of the street and given shelter or housing.