L.A. County centralizes its homelessness response

A recently created dispatch center aims to better coordinate the many local efforts to get people off the streets and into housing

- Andrew Khouri

The request came in June.

A staff member for Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath emailed the county's newly established Emergency Centralized Response Center, asking for a cleanup of a reoccurring homeless encampment along a rail line in the San Fernando Valley.

Joshua Chung, an analyst with the Emergency Centralized Response Center, or ECRC, said he quickly got to work.

He contacted outreach workers at nonprofits in the area to compile names of people living at the Northridge encampment. He then coordinated with multiple county departments to see if beds were available for those individuals, and if they would qualify for special services because of health problems or drug addiction.

It was all in preparation for the day in late July when crews would arrive at the train tracks and throw away tarps and tents, and remove a makeshift electrical line that residents had set up to siphon power from the grid.

Bernice Saavedra said she and her fellow outreach workers at the nonprofit L.A. Family Housing had about a month before the cleanup to contact residents and find them help. Before ECRC, she said they often had just a few days. Sometimes only 24 hours.

"The more time we have to engage, the more time we have to have thorough conversations," Saavedra said. "There's a better chance of getting people indoors."

L.A. County's Emergency Centralized Response Center launched in January with a goal of better coordinating the various efforts among different government agencies and nonprofits to clean encampments, and get people healthcare and into temporary or permanent housing.

The dispatch center was established following a request from Supervisors Horvath and Kathryn Barger and is part of a larger stated effort to increase accountability and coordination when it comes to homelessness services, including a new county homelessness department that will launch next year.