A proposal to buy three homes in the San Fernando Valley to house homeless families was awarded a $200,000 grant, it was announced Monday.
The Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles is backing a project by LA Family Housing to buy three homes to convert into temporary, or “interim” housing for families, over a two-year period, as part of an effort to get away from placing families experiencing homelessness into motels.
The project is similar to sites that LA Family Housing now runs in the Valley, including one in Van Nuys, where a woman and her granddaughter recently found shelter, after LAPD patrol officers and the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority’s HOPE team came to their aid.
A growing number of LA Family Housing clients have been homeless families, but because of the lack of space in existing temporary housing, some have been placed in motels and their stays paid for with vouchers.
Andrea Johnson, a spokeswoman for LA Family Housing, told the Los Angeles Daily News that buying up homes to create shared housing beds would give their organization the ability to control the costs and quality of the housing.
“While a motel is better than living on the streets, we cannot control for a motel’s quality or have any influence on its other potential residents,” she said.
Stays at motels can also average out to about $100 per night, Johnson said.
LA Family Housing representatives have said that on a given night, their organization is providing or paying for vouchers to as many as 200 or more families to stay in motels.
Johnson said LA Family Housing has been turning away from using motels, and moving toward leasing single-family homes to let families “lay the groundwork for long-term stability while we work with them to find their new permanent home.”
LA Family Housing also received a $5 million grant from Jeff Bezos’ philanthropic organization to create alternatives to motels for as many as 150 families, and Los Angeles Councilwoman Nury Martinez recently proposed that the city look into a similar plan to buy and create shared single-family home shelters.
The Jewish Community Foundation also funded a project proposed by the organization Brilliant Corners, to take over and convert a motel in the mid-city Los Angeles area into temporary housing, and a project by The People Concern to use manufactured housing construction and modular building structures to provide housing. These two groups were also awarded $200,000 grants each.
