Overview
- Wednesday, Mayor Karen Bass told a House oversight subcommittee she was unavailable to testify on Sept. 15 and announced she will resign her seat on the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority commission.
- The DOGE subcommittee said it will hold the Sept. 15 hearing without Bass and that Bass’s office is collecting records requested by the panel, with documents due to the committee by Sept. 14.
- Federal watchdogs have investigated LAHSA for alleged false statements, weak financial controls and conflict-of-interest failures, and HUD suspended LAHSA’s access to new federal grants in June before a judge temporarily blocked that suspension.
- Congressional inquiry and reporting point to specific contract concerns, including a $2.1 million contract tied to the former LAHSA CEO’s husband’s employer and large grants to nonprofits such as 1736 Family Crisis Center.
- Los Angeles County has moved cash out of LAHSA and created its own homelessness office, and Bass’s exit increases the likelihood the city will seek a separate, city-run system and could affect how federal money flows to homeless services.