CalMatters filed a lawsuit last week to find out, after the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority repeatedly denied our attempts to inspect shelter incident reports under California’s Public Records Act.
Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority workers observe L.A. city sanitation workers removing an encampment during a “CARE+” sweep on Venice Boulevard in Venice Beach in June 2023.If you're enjoying this article, you'll love our daily morning newsletter, How To LA. Every weekday, you'll get fresh, community-driven stories that catch you up with our independent local news. The law allows the public broad access to governmental records.
The agency has said that the reports fall under “attorney-client privilege” and are therefore exempt from the public records law. However, reports are typically created by contractors, not attorneys. CalMatters and its attorneys at Covington & Burling repeatedly asked for evidence that the reports are communicated to attorneys; the agency did not provide it.
“Therefore, it is unclear how the authority can claim that these records are exempt to protect the privacy of police officers,” the lawsuit states. Additionally, the Hemet case “makes clear that exempting large categories of public documents which happened to become ‘relevant’ to later litigation” is contrary to the Public Records Act, according to the suit.
The state of California does not maintain any central list of homeless shelters, let alone regularly track issues like deaths or violence, leaving most oversight to local agencies like LAHSA.“What happens in shelters remains largely a ‘black box,’” the lawsuit states. “Because of the lack of public access to homeless shelters, CalMatters relies extensively on public records for its investigative reporting on this topic of immense public concern.
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