City to Seek $20 Million in Funds for Homeless : Social services: To be considered for a federal grant, local officials must target the specific regions of Los Angeles that have the worst problems.

Hoping to aid areas hardest hit by the nation’s biggest homeless problem, the Los Angeles City Council has decided to seek up to $20 million in federal funds under a new Clinton Administration program designed to improve the delivery of services to those without shelter.

The Dec. 17 council action, awaiting likely approval by Mayor Richard Riordan, would put Los Angeles in contention for $100 million that will be distributed to four cities under the new federal program. Washington was the first city to receive a grant, and officials say Los Angeles is well positioned to become the second.

The federal goal is to reduce homelessness in targeted cities by better coordinating available services and providing new outreach programs, emergency shelters and long-term housing. Specifically, they say, the federal Housing and Urban Development Department wants to identify urban areas that have large concentrations of homeless who can be aided by improving programs.

In Los Angeles, local officials say, those areas are South-Central, Pico-Union, Downtown and East Los Angeles. A report presented to lawmakers points out that both South-Central and East Los Angeles have high poverty levels and a dearth of homeless service programs that lead many homeless to migrate Downtown, where more services exist.

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The report adds that recent studies document more than 80,000 homeless countywide--a 13.2% increase over previous years. In metropolitan Los Angeles alone, one study says there may be up to 5,600 homeless families--with 10,700 children--at any one time, according to the report.

The enormity of Los Angeles’ problem with homelessness has forced city officials to target specific areas or risk being overlooked for the federal grant, officials said last week.

At a hearing before the council’s Housing and Community Redevelopment Committee, one city official said the need to focus Los Angeles’ efforts was pivotal. Gloria Clark, director of human services and neighborhood development for the city’s Community Development Department, said HUD officials have a concern that Los Angeles is “so large” that even a $20-million appropriation “might (have) no visible impact” on homelessness.

While officials initially planned to target only four areas of the city, the Northeast San Fernando community of Pacoima was added to the grant application at the urging of that area’s councilman, Richard Alarcon.

“I don’t want to be geographic about this. Clearly East L.A. and the South-Central area have homeless challenges that need to be focused on,” Alarcon said at the committee meeting.

However, Alarcon said, the city’s homeless problem--and lack of affordable housing--is not confined to its central core. “I know my district has the highest number of persons per household. And it seems to me that raises the possibility of homelessness,” he said.

“I know that we have a major homeless problem in the northeast San Fernando Valley as well as throughout the San Fernando Valley,” Alarcon said. “So I am concerned when there is no mention of that, particularly given the housing conditions.”

At the request of Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg, Echo Park was also added to the application.

Although more services and better coordination are important, Los Angeles does have in place the sort of private, nonprofit network of programs now under study by Washington, D.C., according to officials with Los Angeles’ Community Development Department.

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As such, they say, Los Angeles’ experience--as well as its predicament--with the homeless should be viewed favorably as federal officials review grant applications.

As Community Development Department officials have described it, the grant could provide an array of services. One goal, they say, is a computer system that would enable homeless people to be referred to appropriate public and private agencies for services.

In addition, officials hope to tailor programs for groups of homeless ranging from the mentally ill--a group “often forgotten,” said Clark--to homeless families, who she said constitute the fastest-growing segment of the homeless population.

“We indicated in our report the tremendous increase in homelessness,” Clark said, adding somberly, “I don’t think that’s something we need to say. I think everybody here is aware of that.”