At least 14 unhoused people froze to death in 2021 in Los Angeles County, but the city of L.A. throws away vital winter items in sweeps of tent communities — and it did so again this year, during one of the coldest, rainiest winters in recent memory, unhoused people say. Mutual aid groups who distribute winter gear say they are caught in a painful, expensive cycle with the city, distributing the items one week and watching them get thrown away the next.
One such raid took place on Jan. 12, when city sanitation crews swept an unhoused community under the 405 freeway at Venice Boulevard and Globe Avenue. The crews came at a moment when the department was overwhelmed. For the prior three weeks in Los Angeles, a series of atmospheric rivers had dropped 11 inches of rain in the city. By the time Mayor Karen Bass declared a state of emergency on the 13th, Angelenos had sent in 385 flooding complaints to the Department of Sanitation, only 38% of which it could address.
