The Los Angeles city council is planning to allocate $100 million to fight the growing population of homeless in the city.
City officials announced last Tuesday that they would focus on the payment of houses and other programs that includes Mayor Eric Garcetti's proposal of spending $13 million on short-term rental subsidies and other services this year.
In a report by the New York Times, homeless encampments in Los Angeles have been increasing steadily under freeway overpasses, in parks, and on sidewalks across this sprawling city. There are an estimated 26,000 people who live in the streets instead of under shelters.
Since Mr. Garcetti became the mayor of Los Angeles, homeless population has increased about 12 percent. Like any other mayor of a major city, Mr. Garcetti has taken a vow to eradicate homelessness but fell to criticism due to a heavy-handed approach to enforcement while doing too little to help people find and pay for housing.
"This city has pushed this problem from neighborhood to neighborhood for too long, from bureaucracy to bureaucracy," Mr. Garcetti said in a news conference held in front of City Hall. "Every single day we come to work, we see folks lying on this grass, a symbol of our city's intense crisis," the mayor added.
The allocation proposal will be subjected to the approval of the City Council, and the money would be allotted by the council's committee on homelessness and poverty.
Budget officials estimated a total budget of $100 million to be spent to alleviate the city's problems regarding the homeless. According to Herb Wesson, the council president, the $100 million figure is to symbolize and show their willingness and seriousness to address the matter regarding homelessness in their city.
"We wanted to send a message that we're serious," Mr. Wesson said. "Today, we step away from the insanity of doing the same thing and hoping for different results, and instead chart our way to ending homelessness," he concluded.