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The day after Christmas, Dr. Heidi Behforouz, medical director for L.A. County’s Housing for Health program, sent out a call of distress.
People living in skid row shelters were being diagnosed with dozens of new cases of COVID-19, and Behforouz needed a place to send them quickly to isolate.
The call went to the Rev. Andrew J. Bales, chief executive of the Union Rescue Mission, which before the pandemic had erected a large tent behind its five-story building on skid row to make room for more people without a home.
“We were able to make yet 1 more chess move against this Monster Genius Covid,” Bales said in an email to The Times. “We moved our men inside to 2nd floor and handed over keys last Sunday.”