LA mayoral hopeful Nithya Raman ripped to shreds over fetid hellhole in her own backyard: ‘Failure to lead’
Nithya Raman is being blasted for failing to clear a dangerous LA River encampment after securing more than $4 million in state funding specifically to address it.
Nearly two years after a state grant, the money remains unspent while conditions along the river corridor continue to worsen.
The cash comes from California’s Encampment Resolution Fund, a program designed to move people living in encampments into housing and supportive services.
e California Post first reported earlier this week that Raman secured a $4,011,357 grant to address a sprawling homeless encampment stretching across a 19-mile section of the Los Angeles River.
Roughly 90 people are living in tents, storm drains and makeshift shelters along in the area.
The grant was awarded after Raman submitted a proposal to the state promising intensive outreach, housing placements and pathways to permanent housing.
But to date, the funding remained unspent.
Raman’s office blamed administrative and contracting delays.
“Councilmember Nithya Raman has consistently treated homelessness as the urgent crisis it is, which is why it is deeply frustrating when critical resources get caught in administrative and contracting processes,” a spokesperson told The Post.
The spokesperson added that the Encampment Resolution Fund “is intended to support rapid outreach and housing interventions, not sit idle while City departments work through bureaucracy” and said implementation is expected to begin later this month.
Monica Rodriguez says she’s not buying it and is using success in her own district as to why.
“There’s no bureaucracy,” Rodriguez told The Post. “It’s no different than any other contract that we engage in with a service provider. You issue the scope of work, you work with the provider, and you award the contract. That’s it.”
Rodriguez can use her own record as evidence of success.
Her office received funding through the same Encampment Resolution Fund program and, in roughly the same amount of time, housed 90 people and removed 40 RVs from city streets through her RV-to-Home initiative.
Building on that initial success, Rodriguez said the broader program has now housed 387 people and removed 184 RVs citywide.
“When we got the $5 million from the state for the Encampment Resolution Fund, we had already been doing that work,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez also points to the LA River encampment as evidence that Raman’s campaign message of “urgency on homelessness” does not match their pace of progress.
“She chairs the homeless and housing committee and is now asking people to give her a promotion,” Rodriguez said.
The California Post has documented people living inside flood channels, beneath bridges and inside concrete culverts along the river.
Outreach workers and advocates have described rampant methamphetamine use, untreated mental illness, criminal activity and a revolving cycle of incarceration and homelessness.
Rodriguez said she cannot understand why other council districts have successfully moved Encampment Resolution Fund projects forward while Raman’s remains stalled.
“I don’t understand how everyone else is doing what Ms. Raman can’t,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez also points out that Raman is not an outsider looking in.
As chair of the City Council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee, Rodriguez says she already occupies one of the most powerful positions shaping homelessness policy in Los Angeles..
“Based on her failure to deliver in the role that she has now, I don’t understand how she’s claiming that she would work with any greater sense of urgency.”
“The numbers don’t lie,” she said. “The fact that it’s been a year and there’s been no commitment for the expenditure of those funds reflects a failure to lead.”
Rodriguez’s RV-to-Home program has since drawn attention beyond her district.
The initiative is now being used as a pilot program by Mayor Karen Bass’ administration and is expanding into other council districts as city leaders look for new ways to address the growing RV encampment crisis.
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