Commentary: L.A. mayors have long promised to end homelessness. Can Raman break the cycle of failure?

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Set us as preferred From the time I met a guy playing a violin near Pershing Square in 2005, and followed him to the Skid Row slab of pavement where he spent his nights, I’ve listened closely to what mayors promised to do about homelessness in Los Angeles.All of them were going to fix the problem.Antonio Villaraigosa.Eric Garcetti.Karen Bass.None of them came close.Each of those mayors invested vast sums of money and manpower and each of them made inroads.To be fair, they collectively helped thousands of people turn their lives around.

But the problem is not finite, the waves keep coming, and more than 40,000 people are currently homeless in the city.That’s one of the primary reasons Mayor-elect Nithya Raman will get a chance to do what her predecessors could not.In the most recent year of accounting, homelessness increased slightly in the city but declined significantly in Raman’s council district.So Bass is out, and Raman is in after a contentious campaign in which Raman attacked the Bass strategy (which she helped implement) as too costly and ineffective.“Here’s my promise,” Raman said in a video on her campaign website.

“When I’m mayor, we’ll cut tents and encampments in half by the Olympics, and bring everyone in tents and encampments indoors by the end of my first term.”Really?Bear with me, because I’m about to explain why I have some hope that Raman might do a better job on homelessness than her predecessors.But I cringe when I hear such grandiose proclamations.Why?In 2006, I attended a Skid Row news conference where a gaggle of politicians including Villaraigosa touted a 10-year plan to end homelessness in L.A.

County.In 2013, Garcetti vowed to end chronic homeless, and in 2018, he said: “We can cut this problem in half in five years.And in 10 years … we can end life on the street.”From u...