Los Angeles Times

Does L.A. count its homeless, or make its best guess?

A little of both, it turns out — and that’s OK, says Patricia St. Clair of the USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics. “There is error in every number and it’s really a range,” she says. “For policy decisions I think you want the best numbers you can get, so that’s why we try to make them more precise.”