After learning of homeless individuals riding in loops on all-night buses for shelter, shouting aloud while riding a subway and sleeping at the feet of travelers inside Union Station, the board of the county’s largest transit agency voted Thursday to urgently expand its temporary homeless outreach program.

The somber board of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority heard from interdiction teams working day shifts on the gritty Red Line in Los Angeles and Hollywood. After listening to them speak about the county’s pervasive homeless problem spilling into the agency’s transit system at an increasing rate, the board concluded more needed to be done to provide housing to individuals while ensuring the safety of Metro passengers.

Matthew Stevenson, who is newly homeless, and Jasmine Montgomery, who has been homeless since age 10, leave a Red Line car with Jasmine's dog Mamas on Thursday morning, March 22, 2018 after spending the night hopping trains and buses to sleep. Metro is addressing how the homeless are using mass transit. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

A homeless young man sleeps in a Red Line station on Thursday morning, March 22, 2018. Metro is addressing how the homeless are using mass transit. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

Sound The gallery will resume in seconds

Jasmine Montgomery, who has faced homelessness since she was 10, wakes up in a Red Line car on Thursday morning, March 22, 2018 after spending the night hopping trains and buses to sleep. " I like peace of mind," says Montgomery about sleeping on the trains. "They look at everyone on Skid Row as drug addicts. Some of us don't have family. I've been doing this since I was ten," Metro is addressing how the homeless are using mass transit. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

Jasmine Montgomery, who has been homeless since age 10, sleeps on Thursday morning, March 22, 2018 in a Red Line car after spending the night hopping trains and buses to sleep. " I like peace of mind," says Montgomery about sleeping on the trains. "They look at everyone on Skid Row as drug addicts. Some of us don't have family. I've been doing this since I was ten," Metro is addressing how the homeless are using mass transit. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

Stacy Harden, 23, who is homeless, sleeps on Thursday morning, March 22, 2018 in a Red Line car with her sister's dog Mamas after spending the night hopping trains and buses to sleep. Metro is addressing how the homeless are using mass transit. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)



Jasmine Montgomery, who has been homeless since age 10, and Matthew Stevenson, who is newly homeless, sleep on Thursday morning, March 22, 2018 in a Red Line car after spending the night hopping trains and buses to sleep. Metro is addressing how the homeless are using mass transit. (Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz, Pasadena Star-News/SCNG)

“The need is quite extensive and we’ve been surprised by that. Metro is a system that is in dire need of homeless outreach,” Jennifer Loew, director of special projects, told the board, who listened in silence before directing the team led by Loew and Alex Z. Wiggins, Metro chief of system security and law enforcement, to redouble their efforts. The two will bring an expansion plan to the board in May.

Fewer riders

Meanwhile, ridership on trains and buses is slipping, with the exception of the Gold Line between Azusa and East Los Angeles and the Expo Line between L.A. and Santa Monica. Metro attributed some of the drop to riders feeling threatened, especially women who reported being groped or subjected to lewd comments. Some board members want to keep passengers from abandoning public transit and driving solo by removing homeless people from transit lines and platforms while not violating their civil rights.

Los Angeles Mayor and Metro Chairman Eric Garcetti, under pressure to tackle homelessness in the county’s largest city, said Metro must make permanent its one-year pilot ending in May and add teams to more train lines, stations and bus routes. He suggested Metro open some of its parking lots for RV parking and showers.The mayor said he’s heard from Metro customers who’ve encountered mentally ill individuals who act out in a loud, threatening manner.

“The worst case is the person in the back of the bus who has not bathed and is someone with mental health issues,” Garcetti said. “But most folks on the street are not those extreme examples. But those are the ones that stay with riders and they wonder if it is safe for them to take transit.”

Individual approaches

Karen Barnes and Jennifer Mauries, members of Metro’s C-3 Team on contract with the county Department of Health Services and People Assisting The Homeless (PATH), said homeless people have very different problems.

Recently, they encountered Henry sleeping at Union Station. He left his home in Arizona after his father was murdered and grandfather passed away in the same week and ended up in an encampment in Orange County along the Santa Ana River. But after law enforcement broke up the camps, he came to downtown L.A. After contacting his family, Henry was on a bus back to Arizona, they said.

Jeff, an amputee who has been homeless for 40 years, suffers from mental health issues and believes the government is tracking him and conducting medical experiments on him, they told the board. The social workers got him into a motel for a weekend and he’s now in a PATH shelter, they said.

Metro teams have engaged with 1,539 homeless individuals on the Red Line and Union Station from May 22, 2017 to Jan. 5, 2018. Of those, 464 were placed into some form of housing. The 30-percent success rate impressed the board, who favored this approach to incarceration.

“We cannot and should not arrest our way out of the problem,” Loew told the board.

Metro’s $1.2 million pilot program consists of two teams each with five members that include: a medical professional, social worker, formerly homeless person, advocate and supervisor. The program will be expanded to include other rail lines and bus services and that will mean adding more personnel, Wiggins said.

Trouble spots

Wiggins said homelessness is a problem on the Gold Line, Blue Line, Green Line and the Orange Line, the latter a bus rapid transit corridor in the San Fernando Valley. “We are seeing evidence of homelessness throughout our entire system,” Wiggins said in an interview.

The Orange Line BRT is particularly troublesome because the sidewalks and adjoining bike paths have attracted homeless people at night, Loew said. “Those are prime locations for those who are homeless looking for shelter and not to be victims of crimes,” she explained.

Board member Jackie Dupont-Walker said she’s seen elderly individuals sleeping on bus benches. She’s also concerned about homeless people, sometimes families, sheltering from the cold or rain by riding the “owl” bus lines but not exiting. Wiggins said routes from downtown L.A. to Santa Monica will be a key target area once the program expands.

Funding

In March 2017, county voters approved Measure H, a quarter-cent sales tax that will raise $355 million annually to fund homeless services and prevention. The city of Los Angeles voters approved Proposition HHH in November that will raise $1.2 billion in bonds to help build affordable housing units.

Money has gone to homeless agencies of the county and nonprofits, but Metro initially was not included, Loew said. After lobbying, the county agreed that 40 new teams that go out and meet homeless people one-on-one will also visit some Metro facilities. However, Metro hopes to get Measure H funding to build up its own teams, who will coordinate with the county, the Los Angeles Police Department and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, which patrol Metro rail and bus lines.

In 2017, nearly 58,000 people were experiencing homelessness in the county, a 26 percent increase from 2016. The crisis has erupted in the form of river encampments and homeless tent cities in downtown Los Angeles, the host of the 2028 Olympics.

“This is the most difficult problem of our time. It has the eyes of the world,” said Metro board member and county Supervisor Sheila Kuehl.