los angeles’ skid row
The heart of Los Angeles’ Skid Row is comprised of
roughly 50 city blocks (0.4 square miles) of the greater
downtown area, generally east of the Downtown
Historic Core and the high-rise district of Bunker Hill.
It has been defined as being bounded by 3rd Street on
the north, 7th Street on the south, Main Street on the
west and Alameda Street on the east.
Those boundaries have remained over the years because of the
The History of Skid Row: The Skid Row that we see today
entrenchment of the Little Tokyo community to the north and
emerged sometime between the mid-1960’s and early 1970’s but
the heavy industrial concentration lying further to the east. In
the area itself dates to the 1870’s when the railroads were built
recent years the homeless population within Skid Row has drifted
west from Los Angeles Street toward the budding Loft District
abutting Main Street, and south into the adjacent fashion and
flower districts.
Estimates of Skid Row’s population range from 8,000 to 11,000
people. It is a predominantly black male population, although
over the recent years, the number of women and children has
increased as well. About 20% of the population is veterans, and
many suffer from substance abuse and/or mental illnesses. There
are approximately 6,000 permanent residents in hotels and
approximately 2,500 homeless individuals, with actual numbers
varying by season and time of month. Approximately 2,000 to
on the periphery of an emerging downtown. The largely
agricultural fields east of downtown soon gave way to more
industrial uses, which eventually attracted a primarily transient,
male population that arrived by train, for employment by the
railroads and related businesses, or to work in the predominantly
transient agricultural sectors.
From this environment arose the small hotels, transitional living
spaces in their day that have become the single-room-occupancy
residential hotels of today, and a service community geared to
the needs of the workers, opportunity seekers, and others coming
into the area. During the Great Depression, the area’s hotels and
services attracted a population of displaced people, many of them
2,500 persons make use of shelters, mission beds and transitional
addicted to alcohol.
housing rooms in certain of the hotels. Numerous individuals
During World War II, Los Angeles became a stopping point for
on extremely low fixed incomes may alternate among hotel rooms,
people looking for war jobs and soldiers shipping off to the Pacific.
shelters and the street over the course of a month.
In order to entertain this new population, numerous bars, adult
bookstores, and small theaters opened in and around the
Skid Row area.
By the 1950’s and 1960’s, the city determined that many hotels in
the area were substandard and unsafe and needed to be repaired
or demolished. Because of the low rents generated in these
hotels, then largely occupied by an elderly and predominantly
white male population, many owners opted for demolition. This
resulted in a substantial displacement of the resident population,
many of whom could not afford to live elsewhere. As a result
of code-enforced demolition, the housing stock dropped from
approximately 15,000 units to about 7,500 units. In the late 1960’s
and early 1970’s, Skid Row also saw a wave of people returning
from the Vietnam War, largely comprised of young, African
Skid Row Density: Of the estimated 91,000 homeless people
American veterans who were unemployed and suffering from
living in Los Angeles County, it is estimated that 2,521 homeless
trauma or drug addictions.
persons can be found within the 0.4 square miles of the Skid Row
In 1975, Los Angeles adopted a redevelopment plan that called for
area. Those numbers equate to roughly 3% of the county’s entire
stabilizing Skid Row by preserving the single-room-occupancy
homeless population residing within an area that comprises only
hotels and social agencies instead destroying the area, as other big
.0001% of the county’s total land area.
cities have done with their indigent districts.
LASHA Preliminary Estimations of Homelessness in
Los Angeles County: The Los Angeles Homeless Services
Authority (LAHSA) estimates there are a total of 83,347 homeless
people in the streets and in shelters on any one night (point-intime) and 224,203 annually in Los Angeles County, excluding those
in Long Beach, Pasadena and Glendale. Including homeless count
information from Long Beach (approximately 6,000), Pasadena
(approximately 1,200) and Glendale (approximately 400), the total
Since the 1980’s, nonprofit housing agencies, including the Skid
Row Housing Trust and SRO Housing Corp., have acquired and
rehabilitated numerous hotels for use as low-income housing.
Religious missions and 24-hour emergency shelters have expanded
their services. Currently, there are about 6,500 residential singleroom-occupancy units in the area, 3,500 of which have been
acquired and repaired or rebuilt by such nonprofit entities. Many
of them provide social services to the tenants. In addition, there
are approximately 1,270 mission and 24-emergency shelter beds
in the area.
homeless count for Los Angeles County is approximately 91,000.
This is the largest homeless population in the nation for any major
metropolitan area.
Of the 83,347, 34,898 are chronically homeless individuals. These
are persons who have been on the streets for a year or more, or
have had 4 episodes of homelessness in the last 3 years, and who
have one or more disabilities, including mental illness, substance
abuse, and health conditions. The proportion of chronically
homeless people in Los Angeles is 42%, the highest of any major
metropolitan area in the country. Approximately 55% of the
chronically homeless population has three or more disabilities
indicating that these people face multiple barriers to overcoming
their homelessness.
Of the 83,347: 39% are Black/African American, 29% White, 25%
Hispanic or Latino, and 7% multi-racial and other. Black/African
Americans are over represented as they make up only 9% of the
overall County population. Among the 83,347, there are 7,551
homeless families in shelters or on the streets on any one night.
tOf the 83,347, only 9,875 are in shelters.
CRA/LA
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