Mayor Bass: Encampments in LA Should Be ‘Significantly Down’ in 4 Years

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass speaks at the podium at the Lorena Plaza affordable housing project site where she signed an affordable housing executive directive in Los Angeles on Dec. 16, 2022. Mario Tama/Getty Images

LOS ANGELES—Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said on Dec. 18 that she believes 95 percent of the about 40,000 homeless people in the city would accept housing if it’s offered to them, and said she hopes that encampments will be “significantly down, if not eliminated” in four years.

Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Bass, who declared a state of emergency on homelessness on her first day in office, was asked how her declaration would differ from a similar action taken by former Mayor Eric Garcetti in 2015.