{"id":6585,"date":"2026-04-04T03:15:59","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T03:15:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/04\/04\/la-metro-olympics-laist-com\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T03:15:59","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T03:15:59","slug":"la-metro-olympics-laist-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/04\/04\/la-metro-olympics-laist-com\/","title":{"rendered":"LA Metro Olympics – laist.com"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Topline: <\/b>
The plan: <\/b>Metro plans to essentially double its bus fleet for the 2028 Games by temporarily acquiring, operating and storing nearly 1,750 additional buses for spectators. The agency says that will cost about $1 billion. The remainder of the $2 billion appropriations request would be for pedestrian improvements and designing a network of roads for Games vehicles, among other uses.
Final opportunity?<\/b> California Democratic congressional representatives have repeatedly appealed to the Trump administration to provide funding for Metro. In their latest letter from February, they said this budget process is the \u201cfinal opportunity\u201d to secure Metro\u2019s funding request.
Read on \u2026 <\/b>for more details on Metro\u2019s plan, how buses were used in the 1984 Olympics.
The Trump administration did not include funding in its federal budget proposal for Los Angeles Metro\u2019s key plan to use thousands of buses to transport fans to scattered venues hosting the 2028 Games.
L.A. Metro\u2019s Board and California Democrats have repeatedly appealed to the administration to provide federal dollars for the region\u2019s “transit-first” Games. The president\u2019s budget request released Friday didn\u2019t provide a dime of the $2 billion the countywide transportation agency is seeking.
The 92-page document<\/u><\/a> is a signal of the administration\u2019s priorities for the budget for the next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. Ultimately, the U.S. Congress decides how federal dollars are spent.
Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove, who represents Culver City and parts of Los Angeles, wrote a letter<\/a> with her California Democratic colleagues to the administration in February calling this budget process the \u201cfinal opportunity\u201d to secure Metro\u2019s funding request.
In a statement to LAist, Kamlager-Dove said she was \u201cincredibly disappointed\u201d that Metro was excluded in the president\u2019s budget request.
\u201cAt the end of the day, Congress has the power to appropriate money,\u201d she said. \u201cDespite the president\u2019s lack of foresight, I will continue to advocate to ensure this funding is included so L.A. Metro has what they need to succeed.\u201d
Rep. Pete Aguilar, who has a seat on the Congressional subcommittee overseeing federal transportation appropriations, said President Donald Trump has talked about the Olympics \u201ctime and time again,\u201d pointing to the most recent State of the Union as an example.
\u201cOur charge is to ensure that they adequately fund this and that they put the resources behind it so they aren’t just using it as a talking point, but they’re actually leaning in,\u201d Aguilar told LAist in an interview before the president\u2019s proposed budget request was released.
Metro plans to essentially double its bus fleet for the 2028 Games by temporarily acquiring, operating and storing nearly 1,750 additional buses for spectators. The agency says that will cost about $1 billion. The remainder of the appropriations request would be for pedestrian improvements and designing a network of roads for Games vehicles, among other uses.
Seleta Reynolds, Metro\u2019s chief of innovation and Games mobility planning, said at a January Metro Board meeting<\/u><\/a> that finding and preparing the real estate where the buses will be staged involves a lead time of two years, meaning the agency would need a \u201cchunk of funding available by this summer.\u201d
Initially, Metro had asked for $3.2 billion to support a plan to temporarily use 2,700 buses. Metro reduced the estimate for the number of buses needed after LA28, the Games organizing committee, refined the venues and schedule for events.
That reduction, plus other federal funding that Metro has received to partially support station and light rail improvements, brought the total amount of money in the federal appropriations request down to $2 billion, the countywide transportation agency said.
\u201cWithout the full level of funding requested, the complete scope of the [Games Enhanced Transit System] would not be feasible, as the cost of operating this temporary system exceeds Metro\u2019s available operating resources,\u201d the agency said in its statement.
Jacie Prieto Lopez, a spokesperson for LA28, told LAist in a statement before the president released his budget request that the organizing committee was supporting partners in Congress and the administration, who are leading the budget and appropriations process.
“With the full support of federal transit money for the games, we can collectively create a positive commuting experience,” Prieto Lopez said.<\/p>\n

A bus system similar to the one Metro is planning for 2028 was critical to the success of the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles.
Metro’s predecessor, Southern California Rapid Transit District, deployed 550 additional buses, hundreds of new drivers and 24 routes to move people around the city for the Olympics.
In the run-up to those Games, one California Highway Patrol official warned the L.A. Times that congestion around the L.A. Memorial Coliseum would be so extreme that drivers would abandon their cars on the freeway<\/u><\/a>. Headlines warned of “traffic woes.”<\/u><\/a>
Instead, the Olympics offered a surprising reprieve from L.A.’s typical traffic<\/u><\/a>. More than 1 million passengers took buses to the Games.
Rich Perelman, who led press operations for the 1984 Olympics and edited the official report on the Games<\/u><\/a>, told LAist that in 1984, no public funds were used for the additional bus fleet. Bus tickets and some donations and corporate sponsorships covered the cost.
Perelman said organizers pulled off the bus system by staying focused on the areas where parking was sparse, such as the Coliseum. According to the official report, nearly 80% of rides on the bus system were to Exposition Park.
“\u200aIt was a transit-smart approach,” Perelman said. “\u200aIf there was plenty of parking, we didn’t say you have to take the bus. We didn’t make any nonsensical claims of ‘no-car Games’ or ‘transit only Games.\u2019”<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n

Transportation funding is just one bucket that the federal government is expected to contribute for the Olympics.
The budget released by the Trump administration Friday contained major increases for the Department of Homeland Security, including some linked to Olympics preparations. It asks for additional funding for the FBI and Secret Service, which leads security planning for the Games.
Last year, Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” allocated $1 billion for Olympics security costs<\/u><\/a>.
But exactly how that money will be distributed has yet to be determined \u2014 and L.A. politicians have expressed concern that the funds may come with strings attached that the city of L.A. will find hard to swallow.
It’s also possible that money could face delays that could disrupt Olympics planning. The federal government was late in awarding hundreds of millions of dollars<\/u><\/a> that it promised for security for the World Cup<\/u><\/a> this year \u2014 a delay the Trump administration attributed to the Homeland Security shutdown.
Who\u2019s responsible? <\/b>The GEO Group Inc., a private company that operates the Adelanto ICE Processing Center, has not responded to requests for comment. In multiple statements to the media, ICE has said that the agency \u201cis committed to ensuring that all those in custody reside in safe, secure, and humane environments.\u201d
The backstory: <\/b>In May 2025, the Adelanto ICE Processing Center had 14 people in isolation. When the Trump administration\u2019s mass deportation effort revved up last June, the number of detainees in solitary confinement there more than tripled and has climbed since.
What’s next: <\/b>Earlier this year, a coalition of immigrant rights groups filed a federal lawsuit<\/u><\/a> on behalf of detainees, calling for conditions at Adelanto to be improved. The coalition has since requested an emergency court order to prevent further harm. A hearing is scheduled for April 10.
Go deeper:<\/b> Lawsuit alleges inhumane conditions at Adelanto ICE facility<\/u><\/a>
Read on \u2026<\/b> for details about the use of solitary confinement at Adelanto.
The immigration detention center closest to Los Angeles has placed dozens of people in solitary confinement each month since June, according to the most recent data from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
In May 2025, the Adelanto ICE Processing Center had 14 people in isolation. When the Trump administration\u2019s mass deportation effort revved up in June 2025, the number of detainees in solitary confinement there more than tripled. By July, it was 73; by August, 105.
The most recent data available shows that number went down slightly in January, to 74 people.
Ranked by percentage of the detainee population in \u201csegregation,\u201d as it is called at immigrant detention centers, Adelanto is among the U.S.\u2019s top 10 facilities as of January, according to an LAist analysis of the most recent ICE data.
The data shows that of 229 ICE facilities that reported holding people since October 2024, between 50 and 60 usually reported putting at least one person in segregation in a given month. Out of the facilities that did place people in solitary confinement, Adelanto tended to do so less often than others until June 2025. (The facility held just a few people from October 2024 into January 2025.) When ICE\u2019s presence increased in L.A. in June<\/u><\/a>, the number of people sent to isolation in the facility also shot up \u2014 three to five times as many people have been isolated in Adelanto compared to the average facility that used any solitary confinement.
Since June, only two facilities have sent people to solitary confinement more times than Adelanto: one southwest of San Antonio, the other in central Pennsylvania.
Both of those facilities held twice the number of detainees as Adelanto on average from October 2024 through September 2025; but the number of people held in Adelanto since then has tripled, growing larger than either of the other facilities to hold an average of 1,800 people a day since October.
LAist used official, publicly available data from ICE about its detentions nationwide and at specific facilities.
To calculate percentages of people held in isolation as of January 2026, LAist also used official ICE data as recorded by both TRAC Immigration<\/a> and the Internet Archive that was no longer available on ICE’s public website.
Records of \u201cspecial and vulnerable populations\u201d for the fourth quarter of the 2025 fiscal year and records of monthly segregation placements by facility from September 2025 were missing from ICE’s data and are not reflected in LAist’s analysis.<\/p>\n

According to ICE, detainees may be placed in segregation for \u201cdisciplinary reasons,\u201d or because of:
The agency also says it might place detainees \u201cwho may be susceptible to harm [if left among the] general population due in part to how others interpret or assume their sexual orientation, or sexual presentation or expression.\u201d
Not only is ICE holding more people in solitary confinement, but the agency’s data also shows that detainees across the country are being isolated for longer periods of time. Detainees ICE considers part of the “vulnerable & special population” spent an average of about two weeks in solitary confinement each time they were isolated in 2022, when ICE first made the data available. By the end of 2025, the average stay in isolation had risen to more than seven weeks straight.
The GEO Group Inc., a private company that operates the Adelanto ICE Processing Center, has not responded to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

UN human rights experts consider<\/u><\/a> solitary confinement placements that last 15 days or more to be torture, though the U.S. Supreme Court has held that isolation doesn\u2019t violate the Constitution.
The UN also maintains that solitary confinement should be prohibited for people \u201cwith mental or physical disabilities when their conditions would be exacerbated by such measures.\u201d
In January, a coalition of immigrant rights groups filed a federal lawsuit<\/u><\/a> on behalf of current detainees, calling for conditions at Adelanto to be improved. In addition to an unsanitary environment and a lack of healthy food and clean drinking water, detainees say solitary confinement is frequently used to punish those who speak out about conditions at the facility.
People held in immigrant detention centers are technically in \u201ccivil detention,\u201d meaning that they are being detained to ensure their presence at hearings and compliance with immigration orders \u2014 not <\/i>to serve criminal sentences.
According to the immigrant rights groups\u2019 complaint, one detainee was placed in solitary confinement after complaining about the showers being broken. Another detainee said that, after asking a guard to \u201cuse more respectful language toward him, he was ridiculed, written up and given the middle finger by a guard who shouted, \u2018Who the f— do you think you are?\u2019\u201d Then, the detainee was placed in solitary confinement for 25 days.
Alvaro Huerta, the director of litigation and advocacy at the Immigrant Defenders Law Center who is representing detainees at Adelanto, told LAist that when people are placed in isolation at the facility, they\u2019re typically in the same cell for 23 hours per day, unable to receive visits from their families.
For clients who are experiencing mental health challenges \u2014 especially those with suicidal thoughts \u2014 being placed in solitary confinement \u201ccan really exacerbate their condition,\u201d he added.
In multiple statements to the media, ICE has said that the agency \u201cis committed to ensuring that all those in custody reside in safe, secure and humane environments.\u201d The agency has also said that detainees receive \u201ccomprehensive medical care\u201d and that all detainees \u201creceive medical, dental, and mental health intake screenings within 12 hours of arriving at each detention facility.\u201d
Huerta called that \u201claughable.\u201d
\u201cWe have countless examples of people who have said that this is not true, that they’re not getting the medication that they’re requesting, that they’re not being seen for chronic conditions and emergency conditions,\u201d he added. \u201cAnd we know it’s not true because 14 people have died in ICE custody<\/u><\/a> this year alone.\u201d
Topline:<\/b>
Sticker shock: <\/b>Lori Rovner of Manhattan Beach told LAist that one $2,100 ticket had a $505 service fee, bringing the total cost to $2,604.63.
Other prices: <\/b>Some people LAist spoke with opted for only $28 or similarly priced tickets, even if it meant missing some of the biggest Olympic events. One user on Reddit said they purchased 18 tickets for around $550.
Read on \u2026 <\/b>about how much fans are spending on tickets.
Lori Rovner of Manhattan Beach is a big sports fan, so there was no question that when tickets for the Olympic Games went on sale, she’d be signing up.
She scored a slot in the first ticket drop, which launched Thursday<\/u><\/a>, and logged on right at 10 a.m., hoping to score tickets to the Opening Ceremonies and some finals too. After battling her computer to get through “access denied” screens and a lost shopping cart due to a 30-minute time limit, she bought 16 tickets.
It was only when she was about to purchase that she noticed the service fees, which were around 24% of each ticket. One $2,100 ticket had a $505 service fee, bringing the total cost to $2,604.63.
“It’s insane,” she said of the fee. “I don’t understand what the service is.”
As the locals-only sale kicks off and Southern Californians have their first chance to buy tickets to the Olympic Games, some fans are wide-eyed at the high fees on all tickets and the prices in general, which start at $28 but go up to more than $5,500 a pop. Opening Ceremony tickets start at $328.68
The service fees aren’t a surprise add-on. The price fans see when browsing the site is the total cost, including the fee. Still, some who bought in the first phase of sales were surprised when they saw the fees add up.
One user on Reddit of shared their cart of 10 tickets, which added up to $11,264. That included $1,038 in fees alone. Commenters responded in shock and awe.
Service fees are standard in ticket sales, but the percentage they charge can vary widely. High fees have been a source of ire for music and sports fans for years. A 2018 report<\/u><\/a> from the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that the average fees on a primary ticket market were 27%.
LA28 did not respond to LAist’s requests for details on the service fee, like what it pays for or why it’s a percentage rather than a flat rate.
Not everyone seemed bothered by the prices. Some people LAist spoke with opted for only $28 or similarly priced tickets, even if it meant missing some of the biggest Olympic events. One user on Reddit said they purchased 18 tickets for around $550.
“I went with all $28 tickets,” they wrote in the online forum about the Olympics. “I got women\u2019s soccer, gymnastics, beach and regular volleyball, track and field, baseball and a few others.”
For some, the ticket process, the prices and the dense web of events to choose from made it too hard to pull the trigger.
Jeff Bartow of Sierra Madre made a spreadsheet with some competitions he was interested in seeing before he logged on to buy tickets Friday.
“So many times, so many schedules, so many events,” Bartow said. “I think I initially thought I was going to go to a bunch, but thinking about how crazy it’s going to be \u2026 I might be a little more limited.”
This is just the first ticket drop. There will be more opportunities to buy tickets in the months to come \u2014 and on a resale market that launches in 2027.
Some ticket-buyers told LAist they already were contemplating which tickets they’d keep and which ones they’d re-sell, just minutes after buying them.
Topline:<\/b><\/p>\n

The backstory: <\/b>Since the release of the files in 2025 and 2026, there have been no related arrests in the U.S. However, the disclosures have led to some resignations and other reputational repercussions for some high-ranking Americans. The lack of arrests in the U.S. contrasts to the fallout in the U.K., where investigators have pursued charges related to corruption, not sexual abuse, in their dealings with Epstein. Two former government officials \u2014 former Prince Andrew and ex-ambassador Peter Mandelson \u2014 were arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office.
<\/b>
Lack of evidence: <\/b>In the U.S., top Justice Department officials have said that they found no evidence compelling enough to pursue further charges related to Epstein, and that the public can make their own assessments based on the disclosed documents. In a statement to NPR, Justice Department spokesperson Katie Kenlein said that “there have not been additional prosecutions beyond Epstein and Maxwell because there has not been credible evidence that their activities extended to Epstein’s network.” <\/p>\n

In the more than two months<\/a> since the Department of Justice released its latest batch of files on the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, prosecutors have not brought any new charges based on the documents, despite federal lawmakers on both sides of the aisle continuing to demand accountability<\/a>.
The more than 3 million pages of documents include accusations by alleged victims of Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s abuse and thousands of emails and photos showing Epstein associated with prominent figures. The files indicate that many of these people maintained contact with the disgraced financier long after he pleaded guilty in 2008<\/a> to sex crimes that involved minors. Appearing in the files is not necessarily an indication of criminal wrongdoing.
The release of the Epstein files came after Congress passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act<\/a>, which forced the Justice Department to make public all documents it held related to Epstein.
Epstein died in prison<\/a> about a month after a 2019 arrest<\/a> on sex-trafficking charges. Maxwell was convicted on sex-trafficking charges in 2021 and is serving a 20-year sentence<\/a>. Since the release of the files in 2025 and 2026, there have been no related arrests in the U.S. However, the disclosures have led to some resignations<\/a> and other reputational repercussions<\/a> for some high-ranking Americans.
The lack of arrests in the U.S. contrasts to the fallout in the U.K., where investigators have pursued charges related to corruption, not sexual abuse, in their dealings with Epstein. Two former government officials<\/a> \u2014 former Prince Andrew and ex-ambassador Peter Mandelson<\/a> \u2014 were arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, as he is now known, has denied wrongdoing and has not been formally charged. Mandelson has also not been charged, and lawyers for Mandelson have said<\/a> that the arrest was prompted by a “baseless suggestion.”
In the U.S., top Justice Department officials have said that they found no evidence compelling enough<\/a> to pursue further charges related to Epstein, and that the public can make their own assessments based on the disclosed documents.
In a statement to NPR, Justice Department spokesperson Katie Kenlein said that “there have not been additional prosecutions beyond Epstein and Maxwell because there has not been credible evidence that their activities extended to Epstein’s network. However, if prosecutable evidence comes forward, the Department of Justice will of course act on it as we do every day in sexual trafficking and assault cases across the count[r]y.” <\/p>\n

On Thursday, President Trump announced that Attorney General Pam Bondi is out<\/a> of the top job at the Justice Department, following bipartisan criticism over her handling of the Epstein files.
NPR asked four former prosecutors and one former law enforcement officer why there may not have been enough evidence to levy additional charges. Here’s what they said. <\/p>\n

Prosecutors must prove to a jury that a person committed a crime “beyond a reasonable doubt,” according to Barbara McQuade, a professor at the University of Michigan Law School.
“One of the biggest misconceptions people have is how difficult it is to charge and convict somebody for a criminal case,” said McQuade, who served as the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan.
A prosecutor’s ethical responsibility<\/a> is to charge cases only if they believe there is enough evidence for a conviction, McQuade said. Documents, including emails, jokes, and even plane itineraries, can be a place to start, but, alone, they are not enough to prove guilt, McQuade said.
“What you would need [is] rock solid evidence,” McQuade said. “You can’t charge someone for a crime without sufficient evidence, and I have yet to see evidence of a crime involving an Epstein associate that has gone uncharged.”
Based on his understanding of the case, Paul Butler, a professor at Georgetown Law, said he agreed that prosecutors who investigated Epstein’s alleged associates “may have believed that they couldn’t persuade a jury beyond a reasonable doubt.” He said problems with witness credibility or certain forensic evidence can prevent a case from moving forward. <\/p>\n

In the U.K., the two people arrested are being investigated on suspicion of “misconduct in public office.” McQuade said the U.S. does not have a single equivalent federal law. Instead, the U.S. prosecutes public corruption through statutes that focus specifically on crimes such as bribery<\/a> and extortion<\/a>.
After the release of the latest files, British police began investigating Andrew’s correspondence with Epstein when Andrew was a U.K. trade envoy. At that time, Andrew allegedly shared government itineraries, investment plans and notes from official foreign trips with Epstein. The information may have been covered by the United Kingdom’s Official Secrets Act.
Similarly, Mandelson has been accused of passing confidential government information to the late sex offender when Mandelson was a U.K. Cabinet minister. <\/p>\n

Victim statements are essential for establishing basic elements, such as the timeframe of events, required to build sexual assault cases, said Diane Goldstein, a retired police lieutenant from California and the executive director of the Law Enforcement Action Partnership<\/a>. But a victim may be reluctant to come forward<\/a> because of a fear of retaliation, not believing the police can help, believing it is a personal matter, or not wanting to get the perpetrator in trouble.
McQuade noted that in some sex trafficking cases, especially those in which a perpetrator is in a position of power, victims may experience intimidation or threats that prevent them from speaking out.
Victims also may be hesitant to move forward with allegations because they fear having to testify at trials where defense attorneys may attempt to poke holes in their allegations, McQuade said.
Goldstein said that for sex crime cases to advance, investigators need to follow certain policies and procedures. “If you don’t have a legitimate police investigation to start, you’re not going to get any type of criminal filing,” Goldstein said. <\/p>\n

Prosecutors may have considered pursuing charges of criminal conspiracy related to sex trafficking against people associated with Epstein, said Jessica Roth, a professor at Cardozo School of Law. FBI documents in the files relating to its investigation<\/a> into Epstein’s crimes identify certain people as “co-conspirators.”
But Ankush Khardori, a senior writer and columnist at Politico <\/i>magazine<\/a> who worked as a federal prosecutor on financial fraud cases, told NPR those identifiers are not “formal accusation[s]” and are simply part of “interim documents.”
“The FBI does not determine who is a co-conspirator,” Khardori said. “That is a legal judgment that prosecutors make.”
But for those conspiracy cases, “criminal intent,” in particular, is difficult to establish, said Roth, who worked as a federal prosecutor in the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York for seven years. Criminal conspiracy charges “would require knowledge and intent on the part of each individual who was charged,” Roth said. If a person who communicated with Epstein had some suspicion that he was engaged in illegal activity, that alone would not be sufficient evidence to press charges, she said.
Investigators may have considered charges related to criminal tax violations, McQuade said. But the statute of limitations has likely ended on those cases<\/a>, she said, meaning that prosecutors can no longer bring charges. <\/p>\n

Legal experts say the haphazard way the documents were released and redacted makes it difficult for the public to understand why no additional charges have been filed.
Roth, the Cardozo law professor, said the information is in “isolation,” without the appropriate context. “We’ll see an individual photograph that looks perhaps incriminating. We’ll see an email that looks incriminating, but we don’t necessarily have everything that was said before and after that email and that exchange,” Roth said.
One document that could explain why no charges were pursued, according to Butler, is a heavily redacted DOJ memo<\/a> naming “potential co-conspirators” of Epstein. “The parts that should indicate why the department declined prosecution on any alleged co-conspirators other than Ghislaine Maxwell [are] redacted,” said Butler, the Georgetown law professor and a former federal prosecutor.
Butler said those redactions are “unusual” because they do not appear to follow the permissible reasons for redactions in the Epstein documents. Those reasons include confidentiality for Epstein’s alleged victims, or anything that would compromise an ongoing investigation, Butler said.
“When the Justice Department grudgingly releases information when pressed by politics or forced by Congress, it also creates the impression that they have something to hide,” Butler said. “That there is some cover-up going on.”
Copyright 2026 NPR <\/p>\n

Topline:<\/b><\/p>\n

Norwalk-La Mirada Unified:<\/b> Researchers found that Norwalk-La Mirada Elementary Unified School District had the highest rate of student homelessness in the county \u2014 1 in 3 students, meaning that over 4,700 students were identified as experiencing homelessness during the 2023-24 school year out of a total cumulative enrollment of about 15,600.
Underidentifed students: <\/b>Researchers also found that the Transformation of Schools focuses on the lack of dedicated funding for school staff to identify and support homeless students. Students and families facing homelessness do not always self-identify, whether due to fear, shame or being unaware that their housing situation is considered homelessness<\/p>\n

Nearly 30% more students in Los Angeles County experienced homelessness from 2022-23 to 2023-24, making it the county\u2019s highest rate in the past five years and far outpacing the rate of homelessness across the state in the same timeframe, as the resources to identify and support this student population have decreased.
The UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools published two reports on Wednesday on the state of student homelessness in the county: \u201cRising Numbers, Fading Resources: Students Experiencing Homelessness in Los Angeles County<\/a>\u201d and \u201cHidden in Plain Sight: Fear, Underidentification, and Funding Gaps for Housing-Insecure Students in Los Angeles County<\/a>.\u201d
Researchers found that Norwalk-La Mirada Elementary Unified School District had the highest rate of student homelessness in the county \u2014 1 in 3 students, meaning that over 4,700 students were identified as experiencing homelessness during the 2023-24 school year out of a total cumulative enrollment of about 15,600.
The city of Norwalk, where the district is located in the eastern region of the county, was sued by the state in 2024 for banning emergency shelters and other support services for people experiencing homelessness. Last year, the state reached a settlement<\/a> with the city, which was forced to overturn the ban and put $250,000 toward building affordable housing.
Student homelessness<\/a> is defined differently under the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act<\/a>, a federal law that requires every public school to count the number of students who are living on the street, in shelters, in motels, in cars, doubled up with other families, or moving between friends\u2019 and relatives\u2019 homes.
As a result of this expanded definition, McKinney-Vento includes doubled-up students in the count of homelessness. Doubled-up<\/a> is a term used to describe children and youth ages 21 and under living in shared housing, such as with another family or friends, due to various crises.
There were a few other patterns seen in the L.A. County data analyzed by the UCLA researchers:
While McKinney-Vento has an expanded definition that includes more types of homelessness than several other definitions, identifying<\/a> students remains difficult.
The second report from the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools focuses on the lack of dedicated funding for school staff to identify and support homeless students. Students and families facing homelessness do not always self-identify, whether due to fear, shame or being unaware that their housing situation is considered homelessness under McKinney-Vento.
\u201cA lot of these young people are dealing with a lot of trauma, so they don\u2019t want to be identified. They don\u2019t want to be pointed out; sometimes it\u2019s scary for them, because they think we\u2019re going to report them to the Department of Children and Family Services,\u201d said L.A. County Office of Education staff interviewed for this report.
School staff, known as homeless liaisons, who work with homeless students received a historic influx of federal funds<\/a> during the Covid-19 pandemic \u2014 $98.76 million for California, out of $800 million nationwide, from the American Rescue Plan-Homeless Children and Youth.
That funding has since ended, and there is no other dedicated<\/a>, ongoing state funding set aside solely for the rising number of homeless students. This has led districts in California to \u201cheavily depend on highly competitive and unstable federal streams,\u201d the UCLA researchers wrote. Those federal streams have become increasingly precarious as the federal administration last year sought policy changes that would shift how they are structured.<\/a>
LAist is an independent, nonprofit newsroom that is also home to L.A.\u2019s largest NPR station broadcasting at 89.3 FM. We center our coverage around people and communities, not institutions or policies. We hold power to account. We are unapologetically L.A.<\/p>\n

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Download our app for the optimal streaming experienceTopline: The plan: Metro plans to essentially double its bus fleet for the 2028 Games by temporarily acquiring, operating and storing nearly 1,750 additional buses for spectators. The agency says that will cost about $1 billion. The remainder of the $2 billion appropriations request would be for pedestrian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6586,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-6585","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}