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The New York Times
October 31, 2007
Los Angeles Journal
Some Respite, if Little Cheer, for Skid Row Homeless
By SOLOMON MOORE
LOS ANGELES, Oct. 30 - Not so long ago, Kenneth Johnson, 29, lived in
a West Los Angeles condominium with his wife and three children and
earned $4,000 a month as a forklift operator.
Now he is unemployed and divorced, and beds down each night on a grimy
sidewalk in downtown's 50-square-block Skid Row.
"It's weird to be down here," said Mr. Johnson, leaning against a wall
as night fell. "It's not a very easy feeling, but over a couple of
weeks I got used to it."
Like thousands of others in this despairing city within a city, Mr.
Johnson came to Skid Row because it is the easiest place in Los
Angeles to find services, shelter and three square meals a day.
And beginning this month, the neighborhood's homeless have also been
guaranteed some respite from the police. Under pressure from the
American Civil Liberties Union, Los Angeles agreed on Oct. 10 not to
appeal a federal court order and will instead allow sleeping on the
sidewalk, at least until the city provides 1,250 new beds in low-
income housing.
The deal partly rolls back a zero-tolerance crackdown on petty
offenses in the Skid Row area, including sleeping in public places,
that was undertaken late last year by Police Chief William J. Bratton.
The effort has reduced by about half the 8,000 homeless who frequented
the area a year ago, according to police estimates.
Some advocates express concern that the flight from Skid Row has left
people cut off from vital assistance. The police, however, maintain
that the area is safer - for everyone, including the homeless - with
fewer people living on the streets.
As of Oct. 6, the police had made 10,742 arrests in and around Skid
Row this year, 15 percent more than in the corresponding period of
2006. At the same time, property crimes had dropped by 25 percent and
violent crimes by a third, police statistics show.
But while there are 17,000 shelter beds in Los Angeles County, most of
them within the city, there are some 74,000 homeless across the
county's 4,060 square miles, officials say. And despite the decline in
their numbers on Skid Row, it remains an area with one of the nation's
largest concentrations of the homeless. As a result, the shelters
remain full every night, said Andy Bales, chief executive of the Union
Rescue Mission, which operates one of them.
Though the shelters have set up courtyard cots to accommodate the
nightly overflow, some of the homeless prefer the street, which, they
say, is safer. One woman, Guadalupe Ibarra, who showers and eats at
the missions but does not sleep there because she fears for her
safety, gestured at the sleeping bags and tents under a store's
awning. "This is our residence," she said. "We all respect each other
here."
Yet Skid Row's street people have been watching their territory shrink
for years, as downtown developers open the long-neglected area to
gentrification. Late-night restaurants, art galleries and refurbished
loft spaces selling in the high six figures now form the edge of the
neighborhood.
Every few days, Hollywood producers descend upon nearby streets to
floodlight a midcentury bank building or a bar, standing in for the
grit of an East Coast city. Dogs are walked past bookstores and DVD
shops, their owners only occasionally approached for change or
cigarettes. "There's a lot more money people around now," Ms. Ibarra
said. "They put fences and gates around a lot of places where we used
to stay."
She said the changes had pushed many homeless people into East Los
Angeles and the San Fernando Valley, and west to Santa Monica and
Venice Beach. (Homeless-population maps - at http://homeless.cartifact.com/
- that were produced by the police chart the dispersal of street
people from Skid Row since last year.)
Much of Skid Row, however, remains a place of wandering drunks and
drug addicts, with homeless people lining urine-stained sidewalks in
sleeping bags, cardboard shelters and tents.
Lee Ann Salazar, 63, said she had lived on the streets for six years.
She tries to keep on the move, tending to 70 or so stray cats with a
sack of Friskies. Ms. Salazar told of having recently been attacked by
gang members who burned her shopping cart full of possessions.
"Living out here is like sliding down a 40-foot razor blade," she
said. "Your body cannot rest. It's like you're pulling out your
eyeteeth to get up every morning."
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/us/31skidrow.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
October 31, 2007
Los Angeles Journal
Some Respite, if Little Cheer, for Skid Row Homeless
By SOLOMON MOORE
LOS ANGELES, Oct. 30 - Not so long ago, Kenneth Johnson, 29, lived in
a West Los Angeles condominium with his wife and three children and
earned $4,000 a month as a forklift operator.
Now he is unemployed and divorced, and beds down each night on a grimy
sidewalk in downtown's 50-square-block Skid Row.
"It's weird to be down here," said Mr. Johnson, leaning against a wall
as night fell. "It's not a very easy feeling, but over a couple of
weeks I got used to it."
Like thousands of others in this despairing city within a city, Mr.
Johnson came to Skid Row because it is the easiest place in Los
Angeles to find services, shelter and three square meals a day.
And beginning this month, the neighborhood's homeless have also been
guaranteed some respite from the police. Under pressure from the
American Civil Liberties Union, Los Angeles agreed on Oct. 10 not to
appeal a federal court order and will instead allow sleeping on the
sidewalk, at least until the city provides 1,250 new beds in low-
income housing.
The deal partly rolls back a zero-tolerance crackdown on petty
offenses in the Skid Row area, including sleeping in public places,
that was undertaken late last year by Police Chief William J. Bratton.
The effort has reduced by about half the 8,000 homeless who frequented
the area a year ago, according to police estimates.
Some advocates express concern that the flight from Skid Row has left
people cut off from vital assistance. The police, however, maintain
that the area is safer - for everyone, including the homeless - with
fewer people living on the streets.
As of Oct. 6, the police had made 10,742 arrests in and around Skid
Row this year, 15 percent more than in the corresponding period of
2006. At the same time, property crimes had dropped by 25 percent and
violent crimes by a third, police statistics show.
But while there are 17,000 shelter beds in Los Angeles County, most of
them within the city, there are some 74,000 homeless across the
county's 4,060 square miles, officials say. And despite the decline in
their numbers on Skid Row, it remains an area with one of the nation's
largest concentrations of the homeless. As a result, the shelters
remain full every night, said Andy Bales, chief executive of the Union
Rescue Mission, which operates one of them.
Though the shelters have set up courtyard cots to accommodate the
nightly overflow, some of the homeless prefer the street, which, they
say, is safer. One woman, Guadalupe Ibarra, who showers and eats at
the missions but does not sleep there because she fears for her
safety, gestured at the sleeping bags and tents under a store's
awning. "This is our residence," she said. "We all respect each other
here."
Yet Skid Row's street people have been watching their territory shrink
for years, as downtown developers open the long-neglected area to
gentrification. Late-night restaurants, art galleries and refurbished
loft spaces selling in the high six figures now form the edge of the
neighborhood.
Every few days, Hollywood producers descend upon nearby streets to
floodlight a midcentury bank building or a bar, standing in for the
grit of an East Coast city. Dogs are walked past bookstores and DVD
shops, their owners only occasionally approached for change or
cigarettes. "There's a lot more money people around now," Ms. Ibarra
said. "They put fences and gates around a lot of places where we used
to stay."
She said the changes had pushed many homeless people into East Los
Angeles and the San Fernando Valley, and west to Santa Monica and
Venice Beach. (Homeless-population maps - at http://homeless.cartifact.com/
- that were produced by the police chart the dispersal of street
people from Skid Row since last year.)
Much of Skid Row, however, remains a place of wandering drunks and
drug addicts, with homeless people lining urine-stained sidewalks in
sleeping bags, cardboard shelters and tents.
Lee Ann Salazar, 63, said she had lived on the streets for six years.
She tries to keep on the move, tending to 70 or so stray cats with a
sack of Friskies. Ms. Salazar told of having recently been attacked by
gang members who burned her shopping cart full of possessions.
"Living out here is like sliding down a 40-foot razor blade," she
said. "Your body cannot rest. It's like you're pulling out your
eyeteeth to get up every morning."
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/us/31skidrow.html?_r=1&oref=slogin