Reimagined Winter Shelter Program Now Open in LA County

LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority or LAHSA Nov. 1 announced the opening of its Winter Shelter Program for the 2022-2023 winter season. These emergency shelters offer a total of 143 beds across five sites to help people experiencing homelessness escape winter weather. These beds will be available through March 2023. In addition, LAHSA is debuting an innovative new Augmented Winter Shelter Program or AWSP, which will provide motel vouchers to people experiencing unsheltered homelessness in parts of the county more likely to experience severe weather.  

The Winter Shelter Program consists of several temporary emergency shelters that provide a warm place to sleep, food and access to supportive services and housing assistance to homeless neighbors. 

The County of Los Angeles and the City of Los Angeles provide LAHSA with the funding necessary to administer the Winter Shelter Program. LAHSA contracts with several non-profit service providers to operate emergency shelters at multiple locations throughout Los Angeles County.  

The Winter Shelter Program will operate through March 31. During the Winter Shelter season, each shelter will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.  

The homeless rehousing system will utilize the new AWSP during severe or inclement weather. The new program will provide 142 motel vouchers per day for people experiencing unsheltered homelessness in the city of Los Angeles and 367 motel vouchers per day for people experiencing unsheltered homelessness across the rest of Los Angeles County during periods of inclement weather. 

The innovation in the AWSP comes from its usage of motel vouchers during severe weather. Once a severe weather event is declared, all the emergency hotel vouchers can be deployed to the regions of the county that are experiencing the severe weather event. This innovation will allow LAHSA to serve the portions of the county which experienced the most severe weather but do not have a traditional winter shelter facility available.  

LAHSA and its partners will activate the new AWSP when: 

• The National Weather Service or NWS forecast calls for three days of low daytime temperatures accompanied by night wind chill temperatures of 32 degrees or less.
• The forecast calls for 1 inch of rain in 24 hours.
• The forecast calls for three three consecutive days of 1-4 inches of rain or more accompanied by temperatures at or below 50 degrees.

• NWS issues a flood watch or warning.
• Conditions not previously identified by the plan but for which it would be prudent to do so based upon critical need.

If successful, the AWSP could serve as a model for helping people experiencing unsheltered homelessness during other periods of emergency response, including extreme heat, earthquakes, floods, or fires.

The Winter Shelter Program started on Nov. 1, 2022. Any person who needs a winter shelter bed or wants a motel voucher during inclement weather should contact 211 to receive a referral.