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Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass will not be called as a witness at a Line No. 1 federal court hearing where he can determine whether the city’s homeless program is on the receiving vessel.
Attorney Matthew Umhofer, with the LA Alliance for Human Rights, told District Judge David O. Carter on Tuesday that he and his legal team were withdrawing subpoenas issued in recent weeks to Bass and city councillors Monica Rodriguez and Traci Park. The fight against the city’s opposition to the exterior would delay lawsuits for months, he said.
The alliance sued the city over its response to the homelessness crisis in 2020, but initially sought testimony from three politicians as part of an evidence hearing focusing on whether the city failed to comply with the terms of the settlement agreement regarding the homeless program.
The agreement reached between the city and the alliance in 2022 requires the city to provide 12,915 beds to a non-populated population by June 2027. The alliance argues that the city has already not met the agreement’s milestone and that there is no clear path to that goal. City officials say they intend to fully comply with the deadline.
The possibility that Bus could testify in Carter’s courtroom provided a source of unusual drama from hearings over the past week.
Umhofer said in an interview that he dropped bass and others as city lawyers threatened to pursue a complaint to block testimony.
“I think it’s coronavirus that the mayor doesn’t testify,” he said. “She has come to court on multiple occasions to share the points of discussion, but has never been cross-examined. Her resistance to subpoena is the definition of avoiding accountability and transparency.”
Umhofer argued that the testimony provided last week is sufficient to show that the city’s homeless program should be overseen by third party recipients appointed by the court.
The bass spokesman did not immediately respond to Umhofer’s remarks. City lawyer Theane Evangelis said the explanation of Bass Bass’ Bass’ Bass, which was made before a judge at Tuesday’s hearing, was “unresolved.”
“The alliance lawyers clearly acknowledged that their subpoena had no legal basis,” Evangelis said in a statement. “They shouldn’t have issued them in the first place. The city is following an agreement to settle the 2020 lawsuit. It’s uncontroversial that thousands of new housing units have been built and the homelessness has declined in LA for the first time in years.”
Bass declared a state of homelessness emergency on his first day in office in 2022, securing additional authority to award contracts and approved lease agreements for temporary housing and other facilities. That same year, she launched Inside Safe. She also created programs to accelerate approval for certain types of affordable housing.
The alliance portrays the city’s homelessness program as irreparably broken, claiming that the only option is for a judge to hand them over to third-party recipients. During the six-day testimony, the alliance’s lawyers repeatedly highlighted the consulting firm’s findings that the program lacks proper data systems and financial management, leaving them vulnerable to fraud.
The alliance’s lawyers also pointed out that the city repeatedly missed the quarterly milestones established in the settlement agreement.
Last week, city lawyers alleged that their clients had made “best efforts” to comply with the settlement agreement. They also insisted that milestones are not essential. And they said the alliance is a party that “completely ignores” the terms of the contract.
Evangelis said the agreement allows the city’s obligations to be suspended and conditions to be renegotiated in the event of an emergency. The Palisade fire broke out in January, destroying thousands of homes.
“Instead of realizing the great stress of respecting the promise our cities would meet and award… The alliance ran to court the month after those fires and sought sanctions for the city’s supposed violations,” Evangelis told the court last week.
The Alliance put Bass on the witness list last month, saying she has “unique knowledge” about the facts and put her at the centre of the debate by committing to leading the homeless.
City lawyers argued that placing Bass and two councillors on the stand would put “overburden” as elected officials. They instead served as city manager Matthew Sabo, the city’s chief budget officer, and Deputy Mayor Etzemai Agonafer, who is most knowledgeable about the settlement agreement.
Last week, Carter delayed the ruling on whether Bus and Council members should testify, saying they wanted to hear first from Szabo and Agonafer, who are in charge of the issue of homelessness on the base.
Agonafer testified for about four hours on Thursday. Szabo, who oversaw compliance with the city’s settlement agreement, was questioned during the four-day hearing. On multiple exchanges, he said he is confident that the city will comply with the terms of the settlement by June 2027.
The two council members were extremely critical of the city’s homeless program, as they had been sought as witnesses by the Alliance.
Rodriguez, who represents the Northeast San Fernando Valley, uses the phrase “Merry-go-round from Hell” to describe the city’s struggle to obtain accurate data from the Los Angeles Department of Homeless Services, a county of the city.
The park, which represents part of the West Side, said during council budget deliberations last month that the city had wasted billions of dollars on the homeless program. Before throwing her vote, she also said the city “cannot manage” its own homelessness issue.
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