Judge blasts city of LA for 'fraud’ over safe sleep site funding and capacity numbers

There’s a parking lot in the city of Los Angeles lined with plywood platforms where unhoused people can set up tents and they have access to meals, bathrooms and other services — all at taxpayers’ expense.

The Lincoln Safe Sleep Village in South L.A., opened in 2022 and is one of only a handful similar encampments around the state. Public records indicate it was contracted to provide space for up to 88 residents last fiscal year.

But two observers who made separate visits to the location earlier this year — one of them a commissioner with the governing body that oversees the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, the other a “special master” appointed by a federal judge — found the site was operating at half capacity.

Still, LAHSA paid a nonprofit organization $2.3 million to operate