The Los Angeles Times is continuing its commitment to covering the state’s homelessness and affordable housing crisis with a new section on latimes.com that will bring together our best coverage.

This section, which launches today, will serve as a resource for readers, with stories examining the causes of homelessness, and attempts by elected officials to build more housing and stem the tide of people flowing to the streets. There will be opinion columns, as well as photos and videos, exploring the realities of being homeless and of living near encampments. And to help shape our coverage, readers will be able to use the new section to ask questions.

With more than 150,000 Californians — about a third of them in Los Angeles County — now living without a permanent roof over their heads, The Times is committed to pushing the boundaries of what news organizations do. We recognize that digging into causes of and potential solutions is more important than ever.

Therefore, last week, we also launched our first in a new series of visual stories on the homelessness and housing crisis. This one is on Proposition HHH, the $1.2-billion bond measure that voters in the city of L.A. approved in 2016 to build housing for homeless people. So far, however, only one of those housing projects has opened. We explore how that happened.


Readers will see many more such visual stories this year, as The Times tries to unpack why homelessness, by all indications, continues to grow; to assess what actions elected and appointed officials at all levels of government have taken, and have not taken, to resolve the crisis; and to come up with potential solutions.

As homelessness, driven by a shortage of housing, continues to unfold on the streets of Los Angeles and the rest of California, we are reimagining our role at The Times. These are our first steps.