Ask most Angelenos to name the leading tools in combating the homelessness crisis, and two things probably will be mentioned: permanent supportive housing, which places someone experiencing homelessness in an apartment and provides support services such as counseling or drug treatment (and commonly runs more than $600,000 a unit); and Inside Safe, Mayor Karen Bass’ signature initiative to move people from encampments into hotels and motels, from which they may graduate to … permanent supportive housing.
Both are mainstays of the city’s aggressive attempts to reduce the number of people forced to live on its streets — a campaign Mayor Bass has made the centerpiece of her administration — and both have received widespread attention.
More frequently overlooked, despite its important place in the overall response, is a strategy called time-limited subsidies (TLS). Long known as rapid rehousing, this involves getting a person who is experiencing homelessness into a market-rate apartment, and having government funding cover a portion of the rent for up to two years. According to a new report from the California Policy Lab (CPL) at UCLA, this represented 64% of the long-term housing beds in Los Angeles County in 2019.
So TLS is prevalent. But does it work? That is precisely the question that Brian Blackwell and Robert Santillano addressed last November with their 63-page paper: “Do time-limited subsidy programs reduce homelessness for single adults?”
The authors looked at 3,766 people enrolled in TLS programs in Los Angeles County over a two-year period. They found that, during that time and four ensuing years, just 29.2% of those who received the assis- tance needed additional homeless sup- port services. For those not enrolled in TLS programs, the figure was 38.4%.
That means TLS reduced future homelessness by 25% when compared with people not receiving benefits.
In a field crowded with grim conclusions, that’s an encouraging finding, as well as a reminder that the work to address homelessness is often guided by good intentions but rarely shaped by hard data.
“That’s why we wanted to study it. There wasn’t a lot out there to let us know if the strategy was working,” Santillano said on a Thursday morning in February.
Confronting assumptions
THE RESEARCHERS CAME TO the report from markedly different backgrounds. Blackwell is a Brisbane, Australia, native who originally intended to work in information technology but was swayed by world events to look at social structures and operations of power. He joined the CPL and leads its data science research, including for the organization’s landmark Homeless Prevention Unit pilot program with Los Angeles County (see Blueprint, Spring 2020).
Santillano is a California native who earned a Ph.D. in agricultural and resource economics from the University of California, Berkeley. He worked as an economist before becoming a senior researcher at the CPL, where he has focused on matters including homelessness, job training and social safety net programs.
He was drawn to looking at TLS, he said, in part because it offers an alternative to permanent supportive housing.
“You’ve seen this growth in time-limited subsidies because it’s easier to scale,” Santillano said. “It’s based on an open rental market, the idea that you can just give people more subsidies to engage with that market. It’s easier to expand than identifying buildings to house people.”
The new study is a welcome addition to the literature and analysis of homelessness. It confronts assumptions that often guide policymakers in this field, sometimes in error: that people experiencing homelessness are uniform in their needs; that addiction, rather than economic distress, lies at the root of nearly all housing deprivation; that many if not most of those who lack housing prefer it that way.
Santillano noted that the subsidies “weren’t really part of the conversation” until about 15 years ago. A couple factors have made them increasingly important: The first is the growing unhoused population, now more than 75,500 people in L.A. County, according to the 2023 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count (new figures will be released in the coming months). Tied to that is a stagnant housing market where rents have soared while supply has barely budged.
“The biggest issue we’re facing locally around being able to assist folks in re-entering the housing market is the rental market itself,” said Nathaniel VerGow, deputy chief programs officer with the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA), which regularly works with the CPL. He noted regional rental vacancy of approximately 3.5%, which he termed “not a healthy rate.”
Although many people experiencing homelessness are moved into hotels, motels or temporary shelters, time-limited subsidies are part of the same pool of long-term solutions as permanent supportive housing. But as Janey Rountree, executive director of the CPL, said during a November webinar for the new study, “There are not enough permanent supportive housing units to meet the demand in Los Angeles.”
Time-limited subsidies, she added, “are filling the gap in some cases or serving people who don’t need supportive services.”
In theory, the process is direct and speedy; as Rountree indicated, someone moves into a vacant unit, rather than waiting for a new building to come online. VerGow said once this happens, TLS funds typically come from city or county government (which allows greater flexibility in use than federal money).
“Subsidies can generally last up to two years and are generally staggered,” said VerGow, meaning the amount of monthly assistance “tapers down” over that time as the homeless person’s financial situation is stabilized, whether through employment or by identifying other long-term public benefits.
The subsidies have emerged as a significant tool for Bass during her first year in office. Last December, during a roundtable discussion about homelessness, Deputy Mayor for Housing Jenna Hornstock said 4,200 people had received time-limited subsidies.
The ultimate goal is for homeless people to find work and pay the market-rate rent on their own. During the roundtable, Va Lecia Adams Kellum, whom Bass installed as the CEO of LAHSA, described both the potential and the ongoing challenges.
The subsidies, she stated, are “a significant way that we house people in this town, because it’s what we have readily available, and we can help with that cash assistance. What’s harder is those rents are so high, it’s hard to get people to have enough earning potential to take them over in full, so that’s why often we still add a shadow subsidy after the tenant takes over.”
There is no set amount of money allocated. The CPL report identified an average assistance amount of $5,815 during the study period, but this accounts for only direct cash outlays and not administrative costs. Santillano stressed that more work needs to happen.
“I’m trying to temper broad statements about return on investment,” he said. “It’s a place where we really want to understand the data better.”
What is clear is that the market of who benefits has expanded. Initially, said Santillano, the funds were intended to help people who suffered some kind of “short-term financial shock.” The broader pool is reflected by the change in moniker from “rapid rehousing” to “time-limited subsidies.” This now includes people deemed to be facing even greater challenges.
Perhaps surprisingly, these individuals have experienced some of the most significant benefits.
Effective across races
The study was effective. Santillano said the team spent more than two years exploring the outcomes for people who received TLS benefits from July 2016 to June 2018, and then how they fared in the following four years. The size of L.A.’s homeless population, while staggering, provided ample data points.
Given historic discrimination in the housing market, Santillano said a goal was to examine outcomes across racial groups. This resulted in a key finding: Black, White and Latino/a participants all enjoyed what the report termed “a statistically significant cumulative decrease” in the rate of homelessness over the four years after they received benefits. The outcome was greatest for Latino/an enrollees, with a homeless services utilization decrease of 30.6% (the drop was 19.1% for Black participants).
Also revealing were the advances regardless of level of need. That ties back to the expansion of who receives subsidies—it is no longer just those facing sudden financial challenges. The report examined outcomes for what it labeled low-, medium- and high-risk individuals; each group saw an approximately 25% reduction in future homelessness compared with similar adults, the study found.
VerGow said this finding rings true, given what he has seen in LAHSA’s work. “It didn’t surprise me,” he said.
Despite the benefits, there remain points of concern. The report finds that only 62% of those enrolled in a TLS program were able to move i
nto a market-rate unit and receive a subsidy. While that hints at an oppor- tunity for improvement, Santillano and VerGow both said that the figure is similar across other programs.
“It’s not a problem that’s unique to time-limited subsidies,” said Santillano. “This is a broader problem that happens whenever government supports the rent of individuals in the private market.”
As Bass, LAHSA and a battalion of public- and private-sector entities work to address homelessness, myriad challenges remain. That starts with the county’s severe affordable housing shortage. Bass also has warned that the expiration of COVID-era eviction protections could result in more people on the streets.
That amps up the pressure. Santillano sees takeaways from the report, starting with the data showing that TLS works. Yet he recognizes this means only so much when tens of thousands of people in the county live without permanent shelter.
“I take it as very positive and good news that there is an intervention that can move the needle,” he said. “It really makes me think about the next steps to move the needle even more.”
