homelessness

Two of our esteemed gubernatorial candidates, the cowboy and the dilettante, apparently could not find ties for the first debate Wednesday night, showing up with dress shirts casually unbuttoned.

Mr. Middleground sported a scruffy sorta-beard, apparently unable to pay for a razor in the midst of California’s affordability crisis. It’s a trademark look that always makes me think if this doesn’t work out, he’ll opt to live on a boat in some not-too-expensive slip by the Bay.

The billionaire wore Nikes instead of dress shoes, a sartorial nod perhaps to his bid to be the outsider-fighter. Or maybe his feet just hurt.

The last two contenders were remarkably unremarkable.

Why start with fashion? Honestly, it might be the most interesting, and telling, bit of insight that came from this first (of three) chances for our next governor to let us know who they are and what they’re made of. If the debate showed us anything, it’s that none of these candidates are hiding follow-me charisma or an excitement-inducing political vision for our collective future.

Yes, there were a few decent jabs here and there about Tom Steyer’s money, Katie Porter’s temper, Matt Mahan’s tech ties and Chad Bianco’s far-right world view. But even those were predictable.

Still, in between the yawns, there were a couple of answers worth noting, ones that might actually give us insight into how the Democratic candidates differ (Despite all the hype, it seems increasingly unlikely that two Republicans will come out of the primary, and even more unlikely that in a Democratic vs. Republican race, the Democrat would lose in blue California.)

I’ll start with a surprising place where I agreed with Steve Hilton, the Republican endorsed by President Trump.

The candidates were asked if they would support a ban on social media for kids under age 16. This is a quickly accelerating idea not beloved by tech companies. Australia and Indonesia already have bans in place. Other countries, including France and Portugal, have them in the works. Florida banned children under 14 from opening social media accounts on their own last year.

And a Los Angeles jury last month dealt a blow to Meta and YouTube when it found the platforms had damaged the mental health of a young woman with their addictive features.

Hilton took the ban question a step further, saying it “misses the point.” He has long argued that it isn’t just social media that is the problem, but having kids staring at a digital device for hours a day instead of interacting in the real world. It was one of the most genuine answers of the night.

“We’ve got to get to the heart of the problem, and that’s the devices and the screens,” he said. “I think that every parent in their heart knows that it’s wrong.”

While Steyer and Xavier Becerra, the former California attorney general, both said they would support such a ban, the remaining three candidates hedged or said they would not. Porter said no to a ban under age 16, but said she “might consider a different ban,” without being specific.

Mahan, who is backed by significant tech money, and Bianco both said they believed requiring parental consent was the way to go (though Mahan said he would ban devices in schools).

As Becerra pointed out, “kids have died as a result of their use of social media,” so it’s a place where policy matters. And if a candidate doesn’t see government’s role in controlling the dangers of social media, what will happen with artificial intelligence?

The candidates also had differences in how they would handle homelessness and the related crisis of housing affordability, though the devil was often buried in the details.

At least for Democrats. For Bianco, the difference was stark.

“We are not dealing with homeless. So stop calling it homeless,” he snapped at the moderators. “It has nothing to do with homes. This is drug- and alcohol-induced psychosis, mental illness.”

Of course, this is wrong. Last year, the UC San Francisco Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative released the results of the state’s most comprehensive survey of homeless people. It found that for most people living on our streets, “the cost of housing had simply become unsustainable.” It also found an increasing percentage of those folks were older — almost half were over the age of 50 — and had become homeless after a hardship such as an illness or a job loss.

“It’s also families who are fleeing intimate partner and domestic violence,” Porter said. “It’s people who are double and tripled up. It’s people who are living in their cars on our college campuses. Homelessness comes in a lot of different forms.”

Most of the Democratic candidates seemed to understand this and embraced the increasingly popular idea of putting more money into helping people stay housed after a hardship, instead of trying to get them housed after they lose their place.

“How can I help you keep your home?” Becerra said. “Because it costs me so much more money to pick you off the streets, provide you with the assistance in the shelter, than it does to keep you in the home.”

But the issue of homelessness is also where daylight emerged between the candidates. Steyer said he and his wife had helped finance low-barrier homes, not just shelter spaces, where people do not need to be addiction-free and where they can bring pets — two issues that are common hindrances for moving folks off sidewalks voluntarily.

Mahan, the mayor of San José, who often touts his city’s success at moving people indoors, agreed that emergency and interim housing was critical, but also voiced support for forcing folks to accept help. Last year, San José passed an ordinance he backed that some say criminalizes homelessness — a person can be cited twice for refusing shelter, and a third refusal within 18 months can lead to an arrest.

“When shelter was available, we required that people come indoors,” Mahan said, adding, “We have to be able to mandate treatment.”

It’s a controversial position, but also one that is increasingly popular. Gov. Gavin Newsom has backed mandated treatment, in a lighter form, with his CARE Court (which is technically voluntarily). And the movement to require people to accept a shelter space or face arrest is growing on the right and even the Democratic-middle.

But there is a fine and dangerous line with mandated treatment and shelter requirements that is often pushed further and further to the side in favor of the clean, safe streets argument. Whenever we start locking folks up — whether it’s in mental wards or immigration detention centers or jails — we should be careful that expediency isn’t trumping ethics.

Of course, the debate would not be complete without the Democratic candidates’ position on our president, speaking of ethics.

Steyer was gleeful that Trump has come after him on social media, a point of pride that he is a relevant figure in the fight against MAGA. He also said he would abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement if he could, which he can’t.

Becerra highlighted his many lawsuits as California’s attorney general during Trump’s first term, and pledged to keep fighting. Porter leaned into her time in Congress and her efforts to help Democrats in other races win.

Mahan took a different route, pledging to fight when necessary, but adding, “We need a partnership, and we need to find common ground with this administration on certain issues.”

Newsom learned the hard way that common ground is what Trump says it is, and shifts without warning or reason.

So what’s the takeaway from all this?

Boring dad; feisty mom; rich do-gooder; striving newcomer; MAGA one; MAGA two.

None of them hit it out of the park, but no one struck out. Maybe next time.

JACK Fincham was spotted leaving casting for a new reality TV show just days after opening up about his rebab and homelessness.

The former Love Island star, 34, flashed a big smile as he emerged from a studio in Soho wearing a retro tracksuit.

Jack looked pleased with himself after he met with producers for a big project for a Channel 5 show.

He sported a retro look in an 1980s Sergio Tacchini tracksuit which caught the attention of a few passer by who stopped to take selfies with Jack.

Jack added a pair of aviator sunglasses to his look and black trainers.

He looked in a high spirits after spending the afternoon with bosses for a secret new telly appearance, which is yet to be announced.

READ MORE ON JACK FINCHAM

HOME HELL

Jack Fincham leaves hotel to walk ‘life-saving’ dog after revealing he’s homeless

STAR IN DOCK

Jack Fincham in court for failing to carry out unpaid work after rehab battle

Jack has had a rough time lately and credited his pet dog Elvis for helping him get through his darkest times.

The reality star confessed he’s struggling with life after rehab as he told fans he’s homeless and living in a hotel with his dog.

Earlier this year, Jack relapsed into drinking and drugs and had just £20 to his name.

He then spent two months receiving £32,000 of treatment at Rainford Hall, Merseyside.

Jack opened up on life post rehab as he took to Instagram.

He admitted that he’s currently homeless and is not sure where to go moving forward as there’s nothing “much left” for him in England.

He said: “In case anyone is wondering where I am, I’m staying a hotel with the dog. I’m just gonna reset and work out what to do and where I wanna live.

“Got my beautiful dog Elvis, without him I probably wouldn’t even be here to be honest.”

Jack has owned his black Cane Corso dog, named Elvis, since at least September 2022, when the dog was involved in a biting incident.

Despite legal trouble regarding the dog being “dangerously out of control” in 2022 and June 2024, Jack has expressed his attachment to the pet.

The second incident that occurred in June 2024 led to a suspended sentence for Jack in 2025.

Meanwhile, Jack’s relationship with his family hasn’t been the same since he returned home.

Jack added: “One thing they told me in rehab and it’s true, you’re not gonna walk out of rehab to a red carpet rolled out for you because it’s stuff you should have been doing anyway.”

He also thanked the staff from his rehab, saying “that level of kindness I wasn’t used to for a while, I found it quite alien.”

Jack remains optimistic and hopes to get back into TV, saying: “I’m gonna do my acting and get back into TV work, I’m gonna do all the things I said I was gonna do.”

Jack previously did a stint in rehab back in 2021, but relapsed before Christmas last year.

He spoke of the spiral back in January, he explained: “Since then I have done drugs, I have done laughing gas.

“I have been so drunk that I’ve kissed a woman over Christmas and don’t even remember doing it. I’m embarrassed, mortified. I feel like an idiot.

“I am a 33-year-old man. I should be settled down, married. Instead I need help.”

Jack first shot to fame on Love Island, where he won over the nation with his charm and went on to win the series.

He won the show alongside Dani Dyer in 2018.

They were paired together on day one and chose to split the £50,000 prize.

But their relationship didn’t last long once they left the villa.

Natasha Cochrane De La Rosa, 26, was born in London but has been left stranded in Spain after new UK border rules for dual nationals meant she was denied boarding on a flight back home

A British-born woman has been left stranded in Spain after falling foul of new UK border regulations that resulted in her being refused re-entry to the country.

Natasha Cochrane De La Rosa was barred from boarding a return flight from Amsterdam to Luton after spending a short holiday there with friends.

On her scheduled day of departure on April 6, the-26-year-old successfully passed through check-in, security and passport control, only to be turned away at the gate, she claimed.

The Home Office introduced updated regulations on February 25 stating that dual nationals can no longer enter the UK solely using a foreign passport.

They must now produce either a British or Irish passport or hold a digital certificate of entitlement.

Natasha was born and brought up in Islington, North London, and has a British father and Spanish mother.

As her parents were unmarried at the time of her birth, her father was unable to automatically pass on his citizenship, something Natasha says has placed her in a ‘grey area’, reports the Manchester Evening News.

She says that in order to return home, she must either pay £589 for a digital certificate of entitlement or apply for a British passport.

To do so, she explained she must ‘prove’ her mother held free movement rights across the EU at the time of her birth – documentation she says she never received.

Natasha, a client success manager who now lives in Haringey, North London, said: “I was born in Islington, I have paid taxes, I have voted. I am a dual national I do have British nationality but the government are saying none of that I have lived for 26 years matters anymore.”

Natasha is currently staying in Spain with a family friend, having booked a flight from Amsterdam to Seville after being unable to return to London.

“Luckily I am privileged enough to have a haven essentially but if I didn’t have any ties to my country, didn’t speak the language or have anywhere to stay I would have been left homeless in the Netherlands”, she said.

“I feel the government have failed and they have a responsibility to dual nationals and the population of the UK that such dramatic and important law changes are effectively communicated.

“People are commenting on my social media posts saying they would be in the same position as me if they had not come across my story. While I do take responsibility for not having checked, why would I check something that for 26 years of my life I’ve never had to do.

“The system is poorly designed and offers no support or understanding for citizens like myself who do not hit the check box but are still a British citizen.”

Natasha originally departed from Luton Airport on April 2, spending several days in Amsterdam on a holiday with friends.

On her scheduled return on April 6, she claims she was able to check in, pass through security and passport control and reached the gate of her homeward flight before being refused boarding.

She added: “They [the airline] called immigration on the phone basically were saying these new laws had come in. I was showing my birth certificate, my national insurance, my P45, my dad’s birth certificate and was still denied boarding as I had not got the right documentation.”

As her parents were unmarried at the time of her birth in 1999, Natasha’s father was unable to automatically pass on his citizenship.

She now faces two options: applying for a passport, which she fears could be rejected — as she claims there is no documentation confirming her mother held free movement rights — or paying in excess of £500 for a digital certificate of entitlement.

She added: “There was not documentation, not to my mother or anyone with free movement rights in the EU given to them by the government. How do we prove that now?

“To prove it we’re having to find HMRC documents or find anything that proves she was here legally. It was 26 and a bit years ago so it’s been a nightmare finding the documents.”

Natasha also revealed that following Brexit in 2021, her mother applied for settlement papers, as did her younger sister who was born in Spain, both of which were approved.

However, she claims she was informed she ‘didn’t qualify’ as she was already a British citizen. She added that she is currently unable to apply for the digital certificate of entitlement, as she still lacks the necessary documents from her mother – and has been advised the process could take a minimum of three to six months, or potentially up to a year, to resolve.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Since 25 February 2026, all dual British citizens need to present either a valid British passport or Certificate of Entitlement when travelling to the UK. To prove citizenship and enter the UK legally, individuals can apply for a British passport or Certificate of Entitlement from abroad.

“Public information advising dual nationals to carry the correct documentation has been available since October 2024 and a substantive communications campaign about the introduction of ETA has been running since 2023. This requirement applies to all British citizens regardless of other nationality and is the same approach taken by other countries, including the United States, Canada and Australia.”

Mayor Karen Bass has had a lengthy political career, spending six years in the state Legislature, 12 years in Congress and the last three in the top elected office at Los Angeles City Hall.

Now, facing the toughest reelection battle of her career, Bass is marketing herself in a way that might surprise some Angelenos: She’s running as a champion of change.

And she’s not alone.

City Councilmember Nithya Raman, who has represented a Hollywood Hills district since 2020, says her last-minute decision to enter the race was fueled by “a sense of urgency that things needed to change.”

Three other major candidates, all political newcomers, argue that an outsider is needed to shake up the status quo.

“We can no longer keep our city together with duct tape and slurry,” said Rae Huang, a leftist community organizer, at a recent candidate forum on housing and transportation.

The race to embrace the mantle of change in the June 2 primary election comes at a moment of political peril for Bass, a veteran Democrat who has racked up high disapproval numbers in several voter surveys.

In recent months, Bass has revamped her messaging, saying she’s been tackling problems that have “been around for multiple decades,” such as homelessness, sluggish police hiring and trash-strewn streets.

Last week, speaking to the Pacific Palisades Democratic Club, Bass said she wants another four years to finish that work. She also implied that, in her zeal to fix the city’s problems, she quietly pushed out a dozen high-level bureaucrats, including those who dealt with trash pickup and police recruitment.

“Let me just tell you that in three years and three months, it is difficult to change what has been a practice for over four decades,” Bass told the group. “I am very clear that there needs to be massive change, and I’ve done a lot of change.”

Raman has portrayed herself as someone who shook up the system while in office, securing a 4% cap on rent increases for more than 600,000 apartments and opposing initiatives she viewed as “disastrous” for the city’s budget. She said the city is falling short on an array of issues, including traffic deaths and housing affordability.

“So much of what’s happening in L.A., our inability to address our biggest crises — our housing crisis, our homelessness crisis, but also essential services like lights and potholes — so much of this has resulted from a lack of clear urgency in decision-making at City Hall,” said Raman, the first L.A. council member to win office with the backing of the Democratic Socialists of America.

Those types of arguments have elicited salty responses from Huang, tech entrepreneur Adam Miller and conservative reality TV personality Spencer Pratt.

Miller, who described himself as a lifelong Democrat, pointed out that Raman runs the powerful five-member council committee on housing and homelessness. He argued that both she and Bass have failed on those issues, as well as on public safety and much needed infrastructure repairs.

“These are the people who have been running the government,” said Miller, who made a fortune developing education software. “So I don’t understand how they could describe themselves as change-makers. They’re the ones who have been the problem.”

Pratt offered a similar take on social media, calling Raman and Bass “two peas in a pod,” while portraying himself as a change agent.

“I’m a wrecking ball to the status quo,” he said in one post.

Neither Pratt nor his representative responded to an interview request.

In one recent high-profile poll, about 56% of respondents said they had an unfavorable view of Bass. In another, about 40% of those surveyed said they had not yet made up their minds about who should lead the city.

“It’s clear that there are concerns among voters about the direction of the city — and the state, quite frankly,” said Pomona College politics professor Sara Sadhwani, referring to the race for governor. “In both instances, there are lackluster candidates, and so we see voters being very much undecided in both of these incredibly consequential races.”

The election season got underway a little more than a year after the Palisades fire, which destroyed thousands of homes and left 12 people dead.

Bass, who was out of the country when the fire broke out, was unsteady in her early public appearances and, since then, has faced sharp criticism over the pace of the rebuilding. She has defended her record on the recovery, saying she cut red tape and suspended city permit fees, while also pressing the Trump administration to crack down on insurance companies that fail to compensate wildfire survivors.

The back-and-forth over change and the status quo broke to the surface during last month’s housing forum in downtown L.A.

At one point, Raman voiced alarm over the city’s elevated “people mover” being built at Los Angeles International Airport, saying it is so far behind schedule that it won’t be ready before the World Cup, which starts in June.

Raman said that as mayor, she would ensure that such projects are finished on time — and replace airport leadership if it fails to happen.

“Nithya, you’ve been on City Council for six years, though,” Huang shot back. “Why have you not moved this forward?”

(At five years and four months, Raman’s tenure is slightly less than that.)

Raman countered that, as a council member, she only has control over certain issues.

“So much of what’s going wrong in Los Angeles requires the mayor to get involved,” she said.

Bass did not attend the forum, traveling instead to New Orleans for a reelection fundraiser. Pratt also skipped. In their absence, the three remaining candidates pounded on a wide array of municipal ills, including broken sidewalks, high rents and sluggish housing production.

Raman, at that event and elsewhere, has sought to differentiate herself from Bass, and City Hall more broadly, by highlighting her dissenting votes.

In 2023, Raman opposed a package of police pay increases negotiated by Bass, saying they were too expensive and would deprive other city departments of funding. Last year, she voted against a $2.6-billion upgrade of the Convention Center, citing similar long-term cost concerns.

Bass, for her part, said she’s been shifting the direction of the city in critical ways. Previous city leaders were too hesitant to build temporary housing for homeless people, she said, leaving them to languish on sidewalks while waiting for government-funded apartments to be built.

After taking office in 2022, Bass declared a local emergency on homelessness and launched her Inside Safe initiative, which has put thousands of people into hotels and motels. Raman signed off on the emergency and the funding for Inside Safe but now says the program is too expensive.

The mayor said she also pushed for changes in LAPD hiring, not just by making officers’ salaries more competitive, but by hacking away at a slow and bureaucratic recruitment process. Speaking to the Palisades Democrats, Bass said she got that done, in part, by changing the leadership and staff at the city’s personnel department.

Bass told the group she’s preparing to launch an initiative to clean up the city’s streets — and that she made a personnel move in that regard as well.

“In terms of cleanliness, I’ve had to change the leadership of the Department of Sanitation, because I couldn’t get the job done,” she said.

Sadhwani, the Pomona College professor, said she doubts that voters will view Bass as a reform candidate. Raman, she argued, is also part of the establishment.

“They cannot run from the fact that they have been in power,” she said.

It was a risky move and Jonathan Torres knew it, but he did it anyway. He let an out-of-town guest stay with him in his room.

Torres, 40, had been living at the Highland Park Motel as part of Inside Safe, Mayor Karen Bass’ flagship program to combat homelessness. He and his neighbors, many of them from a downtown encampment, were told that visitors were not allowed.

Still, Torres kept having people over. After the third violation, he said, the facility kicked him out.

Jonathan Torres spent about two years in a city-leased motel in Highland Park. He told The Times he was kicked out of the facility in December.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

“It’s nobody’s fault but my own, but I just feel it’s unfair,” said Torres, who now lives in a tent in Chinatown. “In the real world, you’re allowed to have people come over. You have visitors. That’s part of keeping your sanity, you know?”

Los Angeles has spent more than $300 million on Inside Safe since Bass launched the program in December 2022, clearing scores of homeless encampments and moving about 5,800 people into interim housing — mostly hotels and motels. The goal was to get each of those people into permanent housing, typically taxpayer-funded apartments.

But even as the mayor’s initiative brings more people indoors, a growing number are winding up back on the street.

The longer the program exists, the greater the share of participants who have returned to “unsheltered” homelessness, according to monthly dashboards which were posted by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, or LAHSA, and analyzed by The Times.

Jeremiah Flores, center, packs up his belongings during an Inside Safe operation in North Hollywood last month.

In 2023, at the program’s one-year mark, nearly 20% had returned to the street, according to numbers posted by LAHSA at the time.

Halfway into Bass’ four-year term, the figure had climbed above 30%.

In December, as the program finished its third year, about 40% of the people who had gone indoors — 2,300 of the 5,800 — were back on the street, according to LAHSA’s dashboard. That includes people who were kicked out of their housing or disappeared from the system altogether.

The growing exodus reflects the challenges Bass faces while trying to help some of the city’s neediest residents, many of whom struggle with mental health conditions, substance use issues or major physical ailments.

Workers with Mayor Karen Bass’ Inside Safe program clean up a homeless encampment along Hollywood Boulevard in 2024.

(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

Bass, asked about the worrisome trend, said she believes that Inside Safe participants need more services to address those issues. She also said she suspects that the longer people stay, the more likely they are to violate the rules and face expulsion.

The goal of Inside Safe is to find permanent homes within 90 days, with a maximum stay of six months, according to the written agreement issued by the city to each participant.

At this point, the average stay is 362 days — just shy of a year, according to recent LAHSA figures.

Bass did not offer any definitive conclusions, saying the city now has outside researchers assessing the problem.

“It’s critically important that we look at the people who left, why they left [and] what do we need to do strengthen the interim housing that we have,” she said. “I have my opinions about it, but the opinions have to be based in science.”

Bass has staked much of her reelection campaign on her handling of the homelessness crisis, which she made a top priority as soon as she took office. She credits Inside Safe with producing a 17.5% drop in “unsheltered homelessness” — people living outdoors or in their vehicles — over a two-year span. That number fell from about 33,000 to nearly 27,000, according to the most recent homeless count.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass prepares to leave a homeless encampment along the San Diego (405) Freeway in Van Nuys targeted by Inside Safe in July. “The homeless should never be living in these conditions,” she said.

By clearing encampments, Inside Safe also benefits the surrounding community, making sidewalks more accessible and reducing the number of encampment fires, Bass said.

UCLA Law School professor emeritus Gary Blasi, an expert on homelessness, said the program has become too expensive to justify the results — and is in need of “a thorough re-engineering.”

Blasi said there were never enough vouchers and low-cost apartments to provide permanent housing to Inside Safe participants in a timely way. As a result, the city has been paying for them to live in expensive motel rooms for long stretches, he said.

“Once they started having people in interim housing for nine months or a year, that should have rang some alarm bells, because that’s just not sustainable,” he said.

Last summer, the Inside Safe program cleared away a large homeless encampment next to the San Diego Freeway in Van Nuys. Some residents went to the Budget Inn in North Hills.

Inside Safe participants also face a wide array of rules. They are barred from leaving the premises for three consecutive days without prior approval. Alcohol and illegal drugs are prohibited in their rooms, which are inspected multiple times a day.

Participants also are frequently barred from bringing in outside food, to keep from attracting roaches, mice and other pests.

“The rules are dumb. They treat houseless people like children. They don’t give people agency,” said Paisley Mares, who lives in an RV in the San Fernando Valley and has several friends who took part in the program.

Executives with the nonprofit groups that run the Inside Safe facilities said the restrictions are needed to protect residents, keeping them on track to find permanent housing.

Violence, threats of violence and property damage are prohibited, and can result in immediate removal from the program. The ban on guests is designed to prevent people from being physically attacked, sexually assaulted or engaging in high-risk behavior, such as drug use, behind closed doors, those nonprofit leaders said.

“We are bringing people indoors, mostly from encampments, where drugs are often the trade of the street. There is also often physical violence. That’s the way people survive on the streets,” said John Maceri, chief executive officer of the nonprofit the People Concern, which runs two Inside Safe motels in Hollywood. “All of those behaviors don’t stop when people come into an Inside Safe setting.”

Executives at the People Concern estimate that 50% to 65% of the shelter clients they work with — not just for Inside Safe, but other homeless housing programs — have serious issues with drugs or alcohol. The number with serious mental health issues, particularly trauma, is also “very high,” they said.

Inside Safe providers acknowledged that motel rooms can be a huge adjustment, leaving people feeling lonely and isolated. They said they work closely with participants to improve their behavior — and turn to expulsion only as a last resort.

“My goal is never to exit anyone to the streets,” said Joseph Bradford III, chief executive officer of BARE Truth, which runs two Inside Safe motels on the Eastside. “I want to keep people inside until they find permanent housing.”

By now, Inside Safe operations are a well-oiled machine. Sanitation trucks roll up to encampments. Traffic officers cordon off the sidewalk with yellow tape. Encampment residents lug their bags onto a bus and head to their destinations.

Robert Martinez, 40, moved to a Budget Inn in North Hills last summer from an encampment near the 405 Freeway. He had been homeless for about five years and jobless even longer, he said.

Martinez, who used to work at a water filtration company, said the Inside Safe motel was better than the street. Still, he chafed at the rules. He wanted his children to visit, which was not permitted.

In November, after learning that a beloved uncle had died, Martinez left the motel for several days — and didn’t “want to be around anybody.”

When he returned, he said, program staffers informed him he’d been away more than 72 hours and would have to leave.

“I had 30 minutes to get my stuff,” said Martinez, who has been living on a sidewalk in Van Nuys.

Erica Y. Pena, left, and Jose Monteon at a homeless encampment in Van Nuys. Monteon told The Times he spent about two months in an Inside Safe motel last year.

(David Butow / For The Times)

Jose Monteon, 29, moved into the same motel as part of the same Inside Safe operation. He said he was kicked out two months later, after program managers accused him of fighting and making threats.

Monteon, who has spent some nights sleeping his car, denied getting physical. But he admitted expressing frustration over the theft of his bicycle and other possessions.

“Yes, I said some s—. But I never said it to a specific person,” he said. “I said ‘Whoever I find out is taking my s—, I’m going to stab their b— ass.’”

Monteon corrected himself. “My bad — poke. I didn’t say stab, I said poke.”

Ken Craft, whose nonprofit supervises the Budget Inn, declined to discuss specific cases. But he said his staff gives Inside Safe participants three chances — unless they have engaged in threats or violence — and tries to find another place for them to go.

“We’re trying to end homelessness, not have people recycle back to homelessness,” he said.

Even with its challenges, Inside Safe has been gradually moving a greater percentage of its residents into permanent housing, where they are no longer governed by such a wide array of rules.

In December, about one out of every four people who participated in Inside Safe since its inception was in permanent housing, according to that month’s LAHSA dashboard. Two years earlier, that figure was about 15%.

Once the program’s hotels, motels and other temporary lodging are factored in, about 55% were in some form of housing.

Bass said those facilities are a vast improvement over the street, providing bathrooms, heating, air conditioning, hot showers, three meals a day and doors that lock. The program is one of several reasons why Los Angeles County officials reported a double-digit reduction in the homeless mortality rate in 2024, she said.

“The value of the interim housing, number one, is to save lives,” Bass said.

Torres, the Inside Safe participant now in a tent in Chinatown, experienced the difference. He entered the program with a history of gastrointestinal issues and abdominal surgeries.

Jonathan Torres walks his dog in November. At the time, he was living in an Inside Safe motel in Highland Park.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

“The whole time I had my housing, not once did I get sick or have to be hospitalized,” said Torres, who grew up in Redlands and Baldwin Park.

Torres said he was in the program for nearly two years. The longer he stayed, the more frustrated he grew over the wait for permanent housing.

In November, Torres told The Times he had received a notice stating that he had violated the motel’s prohibition on guests and was in danger of being expelled.

By then, he was worried about his health and his dog Waku, a Belgian Malinois/Akita mix. (The program allows “emotional support” animals.)

First To Serve, the nonprofit that supervises the hotel, did not respond to inquiries from The Times.

Even after the written notice, Torres struggled to comply with the rules. He said he allowed a woman from out of state to stay in his room for more than a week during last year’s rains.

The day after Christmas, he was back on the street.

In February, his dog was struck and killed by a car. Days later, sanitation workers cleared the encampment where he’d been living. Soon afterward, he was in the hospital, receiving treatment for a blockage in his bowels.

He eventually returned to Chinatown, setting up another tent. He’s been using meth, saying it helps with his medical issues.

For now, Torres has found some of the companionship he craved. In recent days, he’s been sharing his tent with his new girlfriend.

WASHINGTON — President Trump is singling out the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority as a cautionary tale about Democratic mismanagement of publicly funded programs, using it to justify proposed cuts to homeless assistance services across the country.

Trump’s proposed budget for the next fiscal year, released Friday, asks Congress to eliminate the Continuum of Care — a federal program that funds housing and services for homeless Americans — citing concerns about “fraud and corruption” among local agencies that administer it.

The White House points to LAHSA, which manages many homeless services for the city and county, as the example of why the program needs to go.

The agency has faced criticism locally for years for lack of proper oversight and the county is in the process of transitioning programs to an internal department.

“LAHSA has an abysmal record of reducing what is the highest number of street homeless individuals in the United States, and an independent audit issued in March 2025 found that the authority failed to accurately track billions of Federal and local dollars,” the budget says.

The local agency pushed back in a statement after the budget was released.

“Cutting this funding or destabilizing the Continuum of Care program would directly result in more tents on our streets, not fewer,” said Gita O’Neill, the agency’s interim chief executive, adding that under its leadership unsheltered homelessness in Los Angeles has fallen 15% and that 90% of the program’s funding goes “directly to rental assistance.”

Local officials are already grappling with homeless service cuts at the state and county level given budget constraints and LAHSA warned Trump’s proposal would make matters worse.

“If anything, we need additional funding to cover rising costs, not fewer, to maintain our current momentum,” the agency said Friday.

The funding dispute over homelessness services is one front in a broader budget assault on California programs by the Trump administration.

Trump’s proposal also asks Congress to eliminate millions in funding from state initiatives the White House is characterizing as wasteful, ineffective or “woke.”

The cuts, if enacted, would cancel $4 billion in unspent funding for the state’s high-speed rail project, which the White house called a “boondoggle,” and strip grants from the Fair Housing Advocates of Northern California, which the budget criticized for “actively working to dismantle systems of power and privilege that favor whiteness.”

Smaller items are also targeted on the White House’s chopping block: a Los Angeles gelato festival, a dance building in Santa Cruz — which the White House dubs “one of the richest cities in the nation” — and a $3-million grant for a playground tied to an unspecified performing arts center in California.

Trump’s proposed cuts to California projects are part of a broader effort by the Trump administration to reshape federal spending priorities, largely by trading social programs for a massive military buildup.

The president is asking Congress to approve $1.5 trillion for defense and to slash $73 billion from domestic programs, a massive restructuring that would leave states, including California, to absorb costs Washington no longer wants to carry.

Trump made that vision explicit at a private Easter lunch at the White House on Wednesday, telling guests that the federal government should no longer be responsible for funding social programs that many Americans rely on.

“We can’t take care of daycare. We are a big country,” Trump said. “We are fighting wars. We can’t take care of daycare.”

If states want to offer those services, Trump said, they should raise taxes to pay for them.

“Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things, they can do it on a state basis,” he said. “We have to take care of one thing: military protection.”

His proposed budget reflects that priority, which lawmakers will need to contend with as they grapple with the mounting costs of the Iran war and an economic fallout from a military operation that has left Americans paying more items, including gas pump.

Under the proposed budget, Trump is also seeking to make some investments in California projects.

The White House, for example, is seeking $152 million from Congress to turn Alcatraz back into a maximum-security prison, an idea the president has talked about for several years.

He also called on Congress to establish a National Center for Warrior Independence at the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center.

Times staff writer Andrew Khouri, in Los Angeles, contributed to this report.

It has a microwave and a radiator

At garage has been put on Airbnb, complete with bed, bathroom and microwave cooker, and r eviewer Zac Jones said he loved it after booking in for a stay.

A video, which has amassed more than 86k likes on social media, showed the property behind an electric security shutter which rose to reveal the entrance door. Inside it was radiator-heated with a double bed, couch, TV, ensuite toilet and shower.

It even had a fridge. Before his stay, Zac said he really didn’t know what to expect. But once inside, he said he was very pleasantly surprised.

He said: “Someone has put a lot of effort in. It’s got snacks, and tea and coffee-making facilities. Shout out to the owner of this place. This has been one of my most interesting check-ins in a while.”

The garage in Bradford, West Yorkshire is available for £30. Viewers were impressed. One person said: “For the price, it actually looks good.” Another viewer added: “30 quid! I’ve stayed in worse for 100.”

And a third commenter said: “This is totally fantastic idea. If all the planning and building controls have been met. The Government should pay attention to ideas like this. Can you just imagine the very quick fix for many of homeless people.”

When he entered the race for California governor, San José Mayor Matt Mahan pitched himself as a pragmatic Democrat who would prioritize improving residents’ quality of life and government efficiency.

He unveiled a key part of that promise on Tuesday with an expansive plan to reform state government, including tying pay raises for elected officials and other top leaders to improvements on key issues, and pledging not to approve any tax increase until the state proves “that we can deliver better outcomes with the dollars we already have.”

Mahan also delivered a blistering rebuke of ballooning state spending — which, as he often points out on the campaign trail, has increased nearly 75% over the last six years. In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic and accompanying economic uncertainty, California lawmakers approved a no-frills state budget that came in at $202 billion. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s latest spending proposal is nearly $349 billion.

“We have fallen into this lazy, reflexive mindset of always going back to voters and telling them that the only solution to every problem is a tax increase or a new bond or a new rule coming down from Sacramento,” Mahan said in an interview. “We need to step back and take a really hard look at our existing spending and increase the level of transparency and accountability in government.”

His eight-page plan includes ways to measure and track accountability, some of which are drawn from policies in other states. They include lobbying reforms, following up on audit recommendations and overhauling the state’s digital infrastructure and its procurement process — services Mahan described as “clunky and cumbersome.”

He also proposed a “California Performance Review,” inspired by a similar effort in Texas throughout the 1990s, that would review state agencies and solicit input from employees to eliminate waste and inefficiencies.

But near the top of the list is a proposal to tie pay raises for state officials including the governor, lawmakers and thousands of gubernatorial appointees to “measurable outcomes” in areas such as reducing homelessness and unemployment.

“People in the real world don’t get raises if they don’t do a good job,” Mahan said, “and I think it should be the same for the politicians and senior administrators who are allocating budgets, leading projects, making the big decisions on behalf of the people of California.”

Though the benchmarks would be created with input from the state Legislature, Mahan floated one example: reducing unsheltered homelessness by 5% to 10% within one year, something he said he’s accomplished three years in a row in San José.

It’s a solution one might expect from a former entrepreneur and mayor of a city in the heart of Silicon Valley. Mahan made a similar proposal at the local level last year, but it was rejected by the City Council.

“Tying pay to performance is nothing short of revolutionary in government. It’s a private-sector model that is overdue,” said former state Sen. Steve Glazer (D-Orinda), a Mahan supporter who sponsored several bills aiming to increase transparency in government.

Dozens of tech company executives are backing Mahan in the race for governor and have collectively donated millions to his campaign, as well as two independent expenditure committees supporting him.

That has raised concerns from some voters, and criticism from some of Mahan’s opponents, that he would be beholden to their interests and veto future regulations on tech or artificial intelligence companies.

Mahan has sought to dispel those concerns, arguing that he believes AI and social media platforms should be regulated. Of his plan to overhaul state information technology systems and infrastructure, he said that “whenever we spend public dollars, we have to run open, transparent and competitive procurement processes that ensure best value for the taxpayers.”

Though Mahan did not specify how he would link government outcomes to pay raises, state lawmakers have largely panned his campaign and are unlikely to get on board. The change probably would also require voter approval.

Currently, annual raises for elected officials are determined by a citizen commission that was added to the California Constitution in 1990. Changing how that panel works or imposing limits on when it can approve raises would require a constitutional amendment, which requires voter sign-off.

But Mahan contended it would be one of the fastest ways to fix a system that he says works for special interests at the expense of working people.

“I’m under no illusion that this will be easy, but I think it’s a necessary realignment of incentives,” he said. “We have to make ourselves as accountable to the people as we possibly can be.”

GIRLBANDS have long been as famous for their feuds as their roster of hits or attention-grabbing outfits.

And as the Pussycat Dolls capture the headlines again after announcing their latest reunion, Nicole Scherzinger and co were no stranger to beef within the band.

Nicole, Ashley Roberts and Kimberly Wyatt  announced last week they were bringing the iconic band back as a trio, but notably absent were the other original members Jessica Sutta, Melody Thornton and Carmit Bachar.

The Sun confirmed that both Carmit and Jessica were not invited back by the trio, who believed they would be better off as a threesome and Melody was said to have not taken part as per her own request.

Carmit has been open about feeling “betrayed” by the reunion and sparked a bitter feud between the former bandmates.

Let’s take a look back at some other epic girlband squabbles…

DOLL DRAMA

Pussycat Dolls star Jessica Sutta breaks silence amid bitter band feud

TOUGH TRIO

Pussycat Dolls trio put on a united front for first TV appearance

Atomic Kitten

The band that brought us songs such as Whole Again and The Tide Is High had a fair few rows, even ones that got physical.

In 2022 Kerry Katona revealed Heidi Range quit Atomic Kitten after she had a fight with bandmate Liz McClarnon, and she walked out of the band after “someone got slapped”.

Heidi, who went on to join the Sugababes, was picked for the original line-up in the 1990s after Kerry held auditions.

“Heidi and Liz didn’t get on,” she told The Jay Hutton Show. “I think one of them slapped the other one. And then she went solo.”

Kerry herself quit Atomic Kitten in 2001 after a series of rows with Liz.

“I remember some of the fights we had in Atomic Kitten back in the day. Once, Liz punched me from behind after we had a little row. I was furious and got my own back,” she said.

Danity Kane

Danity Kane was active sporadically from 2005 to 2020 and had been signed to P Diddy‘s [Sean Combs] record label after forming on MTV’s Making the Band.

The group was made up of Aubrey O’Day, Dawn Richard, Shannon Bex, Aundrea Fimbres, and D. Woods.

In 2008, Combs kicked Aubrey and D.Woods out of the group, which they claimed was retaliation for refusing his alleged sexual advances.

The group reformed as a trio in 2013 with Aubrey, Shannon and Dawn. They disbanded the following year after a physical altercation when Dawn allegedly punched Aubrey in the head during a studio session.

Dawn filed a lawsuit against Combs in 2024 for alleged sexual assault and inhumane treatment. She also testified against Combs in his New York criminal trial last year claiming she had witnessed him abusing his ex-girlfriend Cassie Ventura on multiple occasions.

Also last year, Aubrey revealed for the first time in the Netflix docuseries Sean Combs: The Reckoning that she was allegedly drugged and molested by Combs.

Sugababes

The superstar girl group became infamous for its never-ending lineup changes.

Eight years after Heidi joined the Sugababes in 2001, backstage rows led to Keisha Buchanan, the only original member left in the line-up, getting the boot.

Heidi revealed the atmosphere between her, Keisha and Amelle Berrabah had been bad for months and the band “couldn’t work together anymore”.

She was replaced by former Eurovision hopeful Jade Ewen, then 21.

Keisha hit out at her former bandmates saying she found it hard to harmonise with them after the departure of original members Mutya Buena and Siobhan Donaghey, and that the Sugababes had become about “being sexy” rather than creative.

The original trio reformed the group in 2023 and delivered an electric set on the legends stage at Glastonbury that year.

Girls Aloud

After releasing several smash hits, Girls Aloud took their first break back in 2009 and reformed in 2012 only to split again a year later.

Things then went sour when Nadine Coyle publicly distanced herself from the break-up when she wrote on Twitter at the time, “You should know by now I had no part in any of this split business. I couldn’t stop them. I had the best time and want to keep going.”

Cheryl quickly slammed her claims, saying Nadine was “full of s***” and had asked for a break in 2009 which led to the band’s demise.

The two women became close again following the tragic death of member Sarah Harding, who lost her fight against breast cancer in 2021.

They reunited in 2024 in memory of Sarah for a 30-show tour, which was the biggest UK arena tour of that year and earned them £850,000 each.

Spice Girls

The Spice Girls are probably one of the most famous girl groups of all time, but it wasn’t all smooth sailing for the Wannabe pop stars.

When Geri left the band in the lurch, at the height of their success in 1998, it was the beginning of the end.

The remaining four members called it quits two years later – and put the blame squarely on the shoulders of their former bandmate.

In a 2014 interview, Mel B claimed Geri gave them no warning before ditching them.

“When Geri left the group, it was so bad,” Mel said. “She left on my birthday and didn’t tell anybody. She just didn’t show up.”

As well as spats with Geri, Mel said the rest of the Spice Girls “fought like cats and dogs” and then made up.

TLC

The trio of Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins, Rozonda “Chilli” Thomas and Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes was the biggest-selling girlband of the Nineties, now second only to the Spice Girls in the UK.

The history of the band, whose biggest hits were Waterfalls, Creep, No Scrubs and Unpretty, includes bankruptcy, lawsuits, illness and death.

A three-piece group until the tragic death of Left Eye in 2002 in a car crash in Honduras, T-Boz and Chilli returned to touring after 15 years in 2015 as a duo and remain a group to this day.

But Chilli was never meant to be in the group originally but replaced founding member, Crystal Jones, who was booted from the group over contractual issues and their desire to replace her.

En Vogue

The R&B group shot to stardom in 1989 but made headlines last year when one of the former members revealed that they had been homeless for the past three years.

Dawn Robinson was one of the founding members of the group – and wasn’t present on tour with En Vogue when they reunited last year and played at Glastonbury.

She stayed with the band until En Vogue’s 1997 disbandment and in 2025 revealed that 28 years on she was homeless and living in a car.

But there was plenty of other drama for the band after they broke up.

In 2012, group members Cindy Herron and Terry Ellis sued former members Maxine Jones and Dawn Robinson for the En Vogue name.

Cindy and Terry also sued Maxine and Dawn for $1 million in damages after the group split, claiming that the two women continued to tour under the name En Vogue.

They won a judgement allowing only Cindy and Terry to use the band name, but failed to receive the damages they wanted to obtain.

After decades of legal woes, both sides agreed to settle out of court.

Fifth Harmony

Fifth Harmony rose to fame on the US version of The X Factor in 2012 and were on track to be one of the biggest girl groups of all time.

But things went off the rails when old social media posts by band member Camila Cabello surfaced and featured racist slurs and derogatory memes.

Even though she apologised for her posts, Normani, the only black member of the group, later addressed the racism she experienced from Camila’s fans, and how she didn’t feel supported by her bandmates.

In 2016, Fifth Harmony announced in a statement that Camila had informed them through her “representatives” that she’d left the group, which Camila disputed.

But the dispute led to a dramatic performance at the 2017 VMAs when Fifth Harmony hit the stage without Camila.

A fifth silhouette appeared beside them, but was then violently yanked away as a clear message they were moving on without her.

The beef continued after Fifth Harmony’s dissolution when in July 2021, when Camila chose the day that Normani released her hotly awaited single, Wild Side, to announce her own new track.

WARNING: Contains spoilers about the Handcuffed final.

The sheer number of people who pulled out proves just how hard Channel 4’s Handcuffed: Last Pair Standing was: challenging 18 Brits to remain handcuffed to a total stranger. And not just any total stranger – one a team of producers have judged will create the most explosive TV possible.

Tonight, viewers saw Staffordshire porn star Rob, 32, and West Sussex homemaker Charlie, 44, make it all the way to the end, winning the show and a suitcase bulging with £100,000. Now, after the pre-recorded series, they explain whether they stayed in touch and just what they plan to do with the winnings.

The reality is quite sweet – with the pair very much in each other’s lives. Speaking about the moment they were uncuffed, Rob said: “It felt great! I just wanted to shout “FREEDOM” at the top of my lungs. It was a nice moment, but also a little sad moment knowing that my partner has now got to go.”

Charlie added: “It was a huge relief. We actually had to wait quite a long time! It wasn’t like we were instantly un-handcuffed. It was a crazy experience but a huge relief. It took a while to get used to doing things on my own, but that’s maybe because I was very overtired.”

But fans of the couple will be pleased to hear that they have stayed in touch in a major way. Charlie explained: “I’ve learned so much from Rob. He’s such a gentle giant and a kind person. It’s lovely now that we don’t have to keep our friendship secret.

“We can meet up and we’ve been texting a lot. He’s been chatting to my husband Simon! I’ve been chatting to his mum! He and his family are coming over to our house this Friday night to celebrate. I learned so much from walking beside him.

“It was a once in a lifetime experience. Rob was really keen that I didn’t put everyone else’s needs first and I’ve tried to implement that since. We talked about a lot of things! Rob is a very deep person and he’s a very good listener.”

Rob said: “One of the first things I’m going to do is a huge Costco run of food and drink and go out with Tilly to feed the homeless. I was very inspired watching what she did on the programme – I’d like to do a few acts of kindness. I’m also going travelling round South East Asia and investing in a new business. And then I’ll put the rest in savings for a rainy day.”

He added: “I learned a lot. I learned that money doesn’t always buy happiness. It’s important to spend a lot of time with your friends and family, and that I was putting work before everything. I was working too hard and not having an equal balance. And Charlie taught me how to make sourdough!”

Speaking about what they learnt about themselves during the programme, Rob said: “I learned that I need to take a little bit of a step back and prioritise different things in my life. And I want to get a bit more into baking and cooking.”

Charlie said: “That I can slow down, and be a bit more patient. And that I can take some time to rest and recharge, so then I can be my best for myself and others.”

Tonight viewers saw host Jonathan Ross taking the final pairings to Loch Lomond in Scotland to take part in a Mr & Mrs quiz to see who knew each other best. The final three – Charlie and Rob, Tilly and Anthony and Morag and Angie – all then competed in a handcuffed race from Scotland, to Wales and on to London.

Viewers saw Charlie and Rob scramble onto a bus where Jonathan was waiting with the key to unlock them – and a case full of the cash.

A majority of Los Angeles voters are undecided about the race for mayor, with support for incumbent Karen Bass at 20%, according to a new poll.

The poll by Emerson College Polling/Inside California Politics found that about 51% of Angelenos have not made up their minds about who should lead the city for the next four years.

Spencer Pratt, a conservative reality TV star, came in second to Bass, at just over 10%. City Councilmember Nithya Raman, a former Bass ally who shook up the field with her last-minute entry, polled at slightly more than 9%. Tech entrepreneur Adam Miller was supported by just over 4% of those polled, with leftist candidate Rae Huang at about 3%.

Although Bass had the most support among the candidates in the June 2 primary election, the poll showed that nearly half of Angelenos are unhappy with her performance. She was weakened politically by her handling of the devastating Palisades fire but has touted reductions in homicides and homelessness.

About 25% of those polled said they approve of the job Bass is doing as mayor, while about 47% disapprove. About 28% said they have no opinion or felt neutral.

The poll, based on interviews with 350 likely voters March 7-9, revealed just how up for grabs the mayoral election is, with less than three months before the primary.

“This is a wide open race,” said Zev Yaroslavsky, a former city council member and L.A. County supervisor who runs the Los Angeles Initiative at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs. “The general narrative [of the poll] is that the mayor is not popular for somebody going into reelection, but the majority of people have not made up their mind whether they’ll come back to her or go to someone else.”

City Councilmember Nithya Raman meets with reporters after filing paperwork to run for mayor of Los Angeles.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Bass campaign spokesperson Doug Herman did not respond directly to the poll. But he said in a statement that the mayor “took on the challenge to change Los Angeles after decades of decline from long ignored issues; resulting in first ever back to back drops in homelessness, 60 year lows in homicides and an unprecedented 40,000 affordable housing units accelerated.”

Pratt said through a campaign spokesperson, “The Emerson poll confirms what we’ve been seeing on the ground — this is a two-person race for Mayor of Los Angeles between me and Karen Bass. Angelenos are frustrated with the direction of the city and it’s reflected in her low approval numbers. Our campaign is gaining real momentum as more voters look for new leadership focused on results and accountability. This race is just getting started.”

Raman’s campaign, however, said she’s the one gaining momentum.

“It’s clear that voters want change, and we’re gaining momentum for our campaign to make L.A. more affordable and to govern with urgency and accountability,” the campaign said in a statement.

The field of candidates did not take shape until the week of the February filing deadline. Billionaire developer Rick Caruso and L.A. County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath both flirted with a run before deciding against it, and former L.A. schoolsSupt. Austin Beutner dropped out after the death of his 22-year-old daughter. With no other major candidate opposing Bass, Raman filed her paperwork with hours to spare.

With petitions still being verified, 13 mayoral candidates have qualified for the June ballot. If no one gets 50% of the vote in the primary, the top two finishers will head to a runoff in November.

“This race could shift dramatically come June,” Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling, said in a statement.

Kimball cited the large percentage of undecided voters of all stripes — 67% of independents, 49% of Democrats and 37% of Republicans are undecided. Pratt is a Republican, and the other major candidates are Democrats in a heavily blue city.

Pacific Palisades resident Spencer Pratt, who lost his home in the Palisades fire, stands with supporters after announcing his run for Los Angeles mayor on the one-year anniversary of the Palisades fire in the Palisades Village on Jan. 7, 2026.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

The poll is not the first to show negative views of Bass.

Last year, after the Palisades fire, a poll of L.A. County residents by the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs found that 37% held favorable views of the mayor, while 49% held unfavorable views.

The Emerson poll also featured questions on issues such as public safety and homelessness.

More than 82% of Angelenos in the poll said they feel very safe or somewhat safe in their communities, while about 17% said they feel not too safe or not safe at all.

On homelessness, the view was grimmer. Only 15% of Angelenos polled said that homelessness is getting better, while more than 55% said it is getting worse. Almost 30% feel it is staying the same.

Los Angeles has seen significant reductions in street homelessness for the last two years, after years of steady increases.

Bass has attributed the declines to her signature Inside Safe program, which clears encampments and places homeless people in short term housing.

“There is no doubt that Inside Safe, by bringing thousands of people inside and reducing street homelessness by 17.5 percent, has saved lives and helped drive this decline,” Bass said in a statement Tuesday.

The Emerson poll also asked California residents about the governor’s race. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) had the most support at slightly more than 17%, followed by Republicans Steve Hilton at just over 13% and Chad Bianco at more than 11%. Billionaire Tom Steyer came in at about 11%.

Nearly a quarter of California voters were undecided, according to the poll.

Paul Mitchell, a political data expert, called the Emerson poll flawed. Not enough Angelenos were polled, and the sample skewed too heavily toward young people, when older residents are more likely to vote, he said.

Mitchell called the poll an “amuse-bouche.”

“This tells all of the candidates [they] should be doing a poll,” he said.