Mobile Homes to House Homeless : L.A. Will Buy 67 as Shelters After Campground Closes

The city of Los Angeles will buy 67 mobile homes to house homeless families after the city’s urban campground closes next month, Mayor Tom Bradley announced Monday.

The 29 three-bedroom and 38 two-bedroom units will be placed “in various locations,” Bradley said, though he did not specify where.

Disclosure of the $401,000 purchase came as the campground, which the mayor opened as a “temporary solution” for a two-month period at 320 S. Santa Fe Ave., nears the halfway point in its life span.

When the facility opened June 15, Bradley said he was seeking “permanent solutions” to the homeless housing problem. Monday’s announcement was the first that addressed what will happen to the homeless when the site reverts to its owner, the Southern California Rapid Transit District.

Closing Aug. 10

The camp will close Aug. 10--five days early--Deputy Mayor Grace Davis said, in order “to dismantle the physical aspects of the camp” before the Aug. 15 deadline.

About 450 homeless people were on the site Monday. The mayor said families “make up 25%” of the camp’s population. “This is our answer to part of the problem,” Bradley said of the mobile homes. “We’re continuing to explore other elements of the solution.”

The mayor found the mobile homes, he said, during a trip to Delta, Utah, last June 8 to help open the Intermountain Power Plant.

“We observed there were a large number of mobile trailers that were housing the construction workers,” Bradley said. “We learned they were up for sale.”

Money From Partnership

Building a Better Los Angeles, a private-public partnership started to aid the homeless, donated $65,000 toward the purchase, Bradley said.

The mayor said details had not been worked out on several aspects of the purchase, including the source of the remaining $337,000 in costs, and the future location of the mobile homes. The mayor said, however, that they would not all be in one place.

He said there are “a number of options” under consideration. Among them, he said, is that “private companies have indicated willingness to place such a facility and provide jobs for people.”

But Bradley would not name the firms, saying, “I don’t want to focus on specifics.”

Details Not Clear

The mayor also was unclear as to how long homeless families would be able to live in the facilities, or what, if any, costs would be involved.

So far, the principal agency helping families at the campground has been Para los Ninos, a Skid Row agency that serves homeless families.

Over the last week, using emergency federal funds, the agency has placed 23 families, with about 30 children, in contract hotels in the downtown area, said Dana Tkac, the agency’s director of development. But this housing will last only two weeks, she said.

“We’re working on obtaining permanent housing for them,” she said.

Reacting to the purchase of the mobile homes, she said: “I think anything that is done to fill the void for adequate housing--whether trailers, building affordable housing or renovating existing housing--is good. Trailers are a good start.”