Los Angeles’ troubled homelessness agency became the latest battleground in the mayor’s race Wednesday, as Councilmember Nithya Raman accused Mayor Karen Bass of failing to oversee hundreds of millions of dollars in homelessness spending and pledged to shift control of that money to City Hall if elected.
Raman’s attack came as Bass prepared to step down from the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority Commission, the governing board of the joint city-county agency that coordinates much of the region’s homelessness response. Bass, who appointed herself to the commission in 2023, has said her experience there reinforced her understanding that the current system is broken and that the city needs to develop its own homelessness response system.
The developments highlight an emerging point of both agreement and conflict between the two mayoral candidates: Both say Los Angeles needs to reduce its reliance on LAHSA and take greater control of its homelessness spending, but they are sharply at odds over who bears responsibility for the system’s shortcomings, and who can be trusted to fix them.
“Los Angeles doesn’t have a shortage of spending on homelessness,” Raman said at a news conference Wednesday. “What it has is a crisis of accountability.”
Raman pledged that, if elected, the city would manage its homelessness funding by the end of her first year in office. She said she would establish an operation within city government to oversee contracts, track homelessness funding in real time and measure providers’ performance.
Providers that deliver results would receive more investment, Raman said, while those that repeatedly fail to meet performance goals could lose their contracts.
She also pledged to give City Controller Kenneth Mejia greater access to audit homelessness programs and contracts under the mayor’s authority.
Mejia, who appeared alongside Raman on Wednesday, accused City Hall of hindering his office’s attempts to scrutinize homelessness spending, including an effort to conduct a performance audit of Bass’ signature Inside Safe program.
“Independent oversight is not an attack on the mayor, it’s a necessity,” Mejia said.
Bass has previously acknowledged blocking Mejia’s office from conducting the performance audit, arguing that allowing one elected official to audit another would politicize the process.
“I don’t believe that one elected official should audit another,” Bass said during a mayoral debate in May. “It politicizes the entire process.”
Bass is leaving the LAHSA Commission after facing scrutiny over her attendance. She missed 13 of 21 commission meetings during a roughly one-year period, according to LAist. Bass told KFI last week that she was stepping down because of time constraints.
Her office said Tuesday that Bass would appoint someone to replace her and that her firsthand experience on the commission reinforced her conclusion that the existing system needs a major overhaul. Her administration is developing a transition toward a city-led homelessness response system, according to the mayor’s office.
Bass’ campaign also defended her broader homelessness record Wednesday, pointing to reductions in encampments and homelessness during her tenure and arguing that her administration has already begun changing the way the city responds to homelessness.
Raman seized on Bass’ departure Wednesday, arguing that it raises questions about who will oversee city money that continues to flow through LAHSA while the city develops a new homelessness system.
“Walking away is not a transition plan,” Raman said.
Bass’ campaign disputed that premise. Campaign spokesperson Alex Stack told the SCNG Wednesday that Bass’ departure from the commission does not change who currently oversees the funding, calling Raman’s suggestion that it creates an oversight gap “intentionally misleading.”
LAHSA has faced mounting scrutiny over its finances and operations as city and county leaders increasingly move responsibilities away from the agency.
The Trump administration moved in June to suspend LASHA from receiving federal funding, alleging serious mismanagement and financial-control failures. LAHSA sued, and a federal judge in August issued a preliminary injunction halting the suspension while the case proceeds.
LAHSA has also announced a series of reforms following an independent review of its financial operations.
The turmoil comes as Los Angeles lost some of the progress it had made in reducing homelessness during the previous two years.
The 2026 homeless count estimated 45,194 people were experiencing homelessness in the city, an increase of 3.4% from the previous year. Unsheltered homelessness increased 7.9%, to an estimated 29,115 people.
LAHSA said the increases were driven largely by a bottleneck in the homelessness system after funding reductions forced a pause in new enrollments in time-limited rental subsidies. The number of people newly housed through those subsidies fell from 10,308 in 2024 to 6,590 in 2025, according to the agency.
The political fight over accountability began even before Raman took the microphone Wednesday.
Bass has repeatedly pushed back on Raman’s attempts to hold her responsible for the city’s homelessness problems, arguing that Raman also bears responsibility as a councilmember who spent three years chairing the City Council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee. At a mayoral debate in May, Bass accused Raman of portraying herself as an outsider despite having served at City Hall longer than Bass.
Bass’ campaign renewed that arguing Wednesday, circulating a lengthy statement ahead of Raman’s news conference seeking to turn the councilmember’s criticism back on her. The campaign attacked Raman’s record as the former chair of the City Council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee, saying she canceled 40 committee meetings and allowed more than 110 pending policy items to stall.
The campaign also pointed to criticism from Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, who has accused Raman of failing to move quickly enough on a measure involving LAHSA reforms.
Asked Wednesday why she had not accomplished more citywide while chairing the committee, Raman pointed to reductions in homelessness in her own district and argued that a councilmember does not possess the executive authority of the mayor.
“In my district, where I had the most direct operational control over our homelessness response, I delivered real results,” Raman said.
Raman said unsheltered homelessness fell 49% in her district in the most recent count, even as it rose citywide. She credited greater use of performance data and efforts to ensure shelter beds, permanent supportive housing units and outreach resources were being fully utilized.
The Bass campaign also criticized Raman over her opposition to expanding anti-camping restrictions around schools and other locations and over the implementation of a rental voucher initiative she championed.
Raman said Wednesday that the vast majority of unhoused people she has encountered will accept shelter when an appropriate placement is available. She acknowledged that a smaller population with severe mental illness may require involuntary conservatorship or law enforcement intervention.
Despite the increasingly sharp rhetoric, the candidates’ prescriptions for LAHSA now overlap in a significant way.
Raman said Wednesday she has pushed for years to build the city’s capacity to manage and oversee its own homelessness spending. She stopped short of predicting the agency’s demise, but said Los Angeles should seek control over key homelessness functions and data systems.
Bass has similarly said her experience on the LAHSA Commission convinced her that Los Angeles needs its own system.