Largest number of chronically Homeless People. Skidrow is the epicenter of homelessness in los angeles. Tell us about that. Skid is this 54 block in the middle of downtown los angeles, and is surrounded lofts,rise and luxury towers,ours bank chinatown, then you have this little spot right in the middle or it is a compact, dense area of 10,000 people. A lot of my experience with , itlessness and the crowd completelyute different place from anywhere else i could imagine. People different names. Some people the devils den, some people call it this is where people go to die. Host in l. A. , homelessness is like the weather. Not worth talking about almost there is a crisis. It was like by this, local residents and officials are paying attention. L. A. County spent almost 1 billion a year simply managing homelessness despite that, more and more people are living on the street. A couple years ago, the city embarked on a plan to curb homelessness. Has it worked . Sophia lee we are still trying to figure that out. We recently passed mr. Which would raise property taxes to pay for about 10,000 Housing Units in the next 10 years. Measure h, a sales , that will hopefully raise 3. 5 billion to pay for more services. We have to take homelessness seriously only when it hits us in the nose. Issue. O lawyer a big it is a crisis. The council finally created a state of emergency and is finally attracting a lot of attention and political traction. But you have to wonder throwing more money at it, we arty spend 1 billion taking care of the folk the homeless. Will not stop the issue. Do we understand the nature of the monster your dealing with . I am trying to figure that out, and so are a lot of people. Host this is implicit in your reporting that poverty so often comes with a value judgment, the misconception that the rich must deserve their fortune, and the poor are not working hard enough. People shared their stories. These guys. By they became homeless after having a stillborn baby, had to pay for his funeral, then used all their savings. Now they are on the streets. Sophia lee right, jane and dmitry is are a few of many People Living on the brink of becoming homeless. It is a bad tragedy for them to get to that point. Aey were doing well, they had car, an apartment, that she had a stillborn baby, and that was a traumatic experience for her. To pay for the funeral, they had to lease out their apartment, sell the car, then they basically ended up homeless. Then they googled where is the best place for Homeless People isgo and google told them it next to the headquarters in venice, so that if they ended up. Right now they still have to struggle to maintain their housing, pay for the rent and hostile. Bute trying to find a job, like for demetrius, he has a long rap sheet criminal offenses. So that is hard for him to find a job. For jane, she still has lingering ptsd from what she experienced, and she has a long history of abuse and many things that is kind of crippling her ability to , even functioned as a normal human being. They have all of these added issues, and is not just homelessness or having a house, but a lot of different problems just in one couple. Our river talking to this one a ministryhad been worker. She told me homelessness is not one problem. There are 1000 Homeless People, complicated,t agonizing problems. This is what we have to deal with. The fact that homelessness is not one issue, it is the consequences of many, many different complicated issues. Evidenced in this one couple. Guestsophia lee is our this morning. We are taking your calls. The lines original, 202 7488000 for central time zones. 202 7488001 for mountain area. Cluster to nancy. Lets go to nancy. I have a couple questions. You talk about homelessness in l. A. I live in the bronx, and we have quite a bit of homeless here as well. I think if you would the homeless instead of housing nonsanctioned, i think it would fix the problem ok, number one. Person,wo, very level but to come on cspan, i think she should learn to speak english better. Host i apologize for that. Next question to you. Homeless people have many needs, but access to food is not one of them. This is something to point out in your story. Why is that a hindrance . When you get people who are experiencing homelessness food, and the i cant say all of them, but a lot do andggle with drug addiction addiction of all kinds. , whenou give them to and theirround them services and homes that where they can get this for, where are they spending food stamps on . Actually go for drugs. So the fact is there are a lot you could not go hungry when you live in a place like los angeles because there are so and places that give food also wellintentioned people giving them food. So in a way, there is not a need for food. What they need is someone to look them in the eye and to treat them like people with dignity and treat them like human beings. That part is lacking. We have a tweet here. So many Homeless People deal with psychological issues we need to address. That is certainly the case. Lets go to the phones, brad from los angeles. How are you . Caller fine. I live in los angeles, have lived here for 20 years. I have seen a dramatic increase in homelessness. I see a direct relation to the highrise development, all the luxury apartments and what they are doing is terry down Affordable Housing and replacing it with highrise at the former tenants cannot afford. I know people that have lived in them, been priced out of apartments and living on the street. You talk about mental illness, one homeless man told me it is sleep deprivation that drives you crazy. As throwing money at the homelessness but also supporting the development of creating the homelessness. A lot of young people, white people. Thanks. Do you care to weigh in . Another question, how is it acceptable that a city allows its own stretch to be basically a wasteland people to live on the streets . Foria lee unfortunately them at that time it makes sense , but it is a convenient location. Convenient location for services so people can go to one spot. One of the became worst because a lot of other neighborhoods did not want Homeless Services in their neighborhood because it crime,es property value, the things people dont want in a neighborhood for the sake of or for their own security and safety. Thats how a lot of people look at it. A lot of the services and the ,ousing, the Affordable Housing got concentrated in one area, and over time, it got worse and worse. Host it also puts a strain on the Police Officers assigned to patrol area. Tell us about that one guy. Sophia lee sophia lee lapd, the sky is muscular bornagain christian who loves his job. Jobold me that he sees his as someone who protects the ,eople nobody else cares about the people addicted to drugs, mentally ill, devastatingly poor. , these areng bangers the people he serves to protect and to guard until they are treated as real human beings. When you walk with him on the streets, Everybody Knows his name. People call him brother. I have seen people walk up to , bump fists with him, and him. He is very well respected and popular because people know he truly cares. When someone goes up to him with a problem, he takes out his notebook, looks them in the eye and listens. Names, and he would say things like how is your brother doing . Tell your father i said hi. You can tell this is not just someone punching hours in his job, but he is a Community Member as well. This go back to the phones where brenda is calling. Caller i would like to put a to all the actors and actresses that live in hollywood who make millions of dollars every year like whoopi goldberg, beyonce, cher, why dont they put their money together and help clean up that city . As a matter of fact, there are plenty of blame vacant buildings they could refurbish and house every one of those Homeless People. Why dont they put their money where their mouth is . It is such a liberal, loving state, california. Why dont they do it they can to clean up that city . Host what about that . Picking up the aspect of having celebrities pitch in, but any efforts afoot, public, private partnerships to help address this . Sophia lee you make between public and private agencies and entities . Host or even people . Sophia lee there are plenty of people that do care because it is so visible. It is staring right into your face. Whove met regular people see someone on the street and actually get down to talk to them, bring them food, build trust, try to convince them to find housing. One guy i know goes to social media. Media. Rtises in social he will post on facebook, this is only done almost 60 years old and cannot last much longer on the streets. ,ind of this fundraising tool but they try to find her housing. Things like that. There are a lot of stories we have not really heard, but those are organic, small efforts. We need something bigger as well. Host carmen is calling from concord, california. Caller thank you for taking my call. The issue i would like to california, the rent is extremely outrageous high. And also, basically people cannot afford to buy homes. Most people cannot afford to buy homes because it is outrageously expensive, and most people cannot afford because the rent has become extremely high. So what happens is they are living paycheck to paycheck, can end up homeless in a moment. It takes nothing. You dont have to be a drug addict. You dont have to have any type of mental issues. This is normal laypeople, families going homeless. It is going hard to even find resources, where to go to help, where can the homeless go to be helped . Some dont have laptops, they cannot google the resources. Even if you call some of these places, nobody seems to know anything. So there is just something going on that needs to be handled better. Our money, the resources, instead of applying that to helping the homeless in a more better way, we have funds going helpinguary cities, provide Illegal Immigrants with attorneys and things of that nature, which is fine, but what about the homeless . We need to address that because it is a major problem in california. It is due to the high rent and the fact many people cannot afford to buy homes. The salaries are very low here. Unless you are a Computer Tech or you are in medicine or certain type of industry, most people are not getting paid very much. The salaries are low. What do you do . Thank you very much. Host what about that . It seems like a perfect score perfect storm. Sophia lee i completely agree there are so many reasons. There are so many things to prod and poke that anyone could really experience. High rent, the fact that housing is so unaffordable right now, the fact that a lot of the services, they are just not enough. All of this is pounded and interrupt errupt so that people are one paycheck away from homelessness. That is correct. Thistrying to understand beast of an issue. What it takes to actually alleviate homelessness. Moneyt know whether more is going to solve it. 3. 5ready are discussing million added to create more services for the homeless. We are still waiting to see what is going to happen. Host but go to arizona for ryan is on the line. Caller how are you doing . I have experienced homelessness before because of a preexisting condition, so i had to go to another state to get my kidney removed. Epilepsy,i am facing and just to get social security, it has been a challenge, just to get food stamps it has been a challenge. In the state that i am in. Im facing homelessness again. But think that trump has put up in this budget are even more of a challenge for people that are sick and poor. What i see for people that are poor, no matter what your race is, is that people that have money dont care. That lack of conscience is becoming the new norm. That is my comment. Thank you. I am really sorry you are going through that. Im really sorry. I think you are right. People need to start caring more. Of thed to the president rescue mission in los angeles, and he said unless there is a ,eart change among the people the issue of homelessness will never be solved. I think i agree. Ultimately it boils down to a heart issue. Do we truly care about people who are experiencing this . Do we truly want to help . Do we truly love and care for them like they are neighbors and not just someone who we want to discard and corral into a 50 block area . I dont know. How do we change the heart of a whole society. That is the question i think we should all ask. Host john is calling from crane, texas. Caller i would like to share a perspective that doesnt seem to be of any emphasis. Any of the colors or your kind of hinted at it with what she said, something to the effect that people on the street need to be convinced to find housing. About chronicking homelessness, i will not go into my life story, but i lived in Southern California for several years. The people on the street, people on the street choose to be there. Say, wego to them and have an apartment for you, and they will refuse for the most part. They will refuse to take that offer. You know they will because there is rules and regulations involved in any kind of housing, whether it is institutionalized housing or whatever, and they want to be on the street getting three meals a day, getting full medical and we know they get that as well. They are on the street getting everything, that is why people are flocking to los angeles and san diego because the weather is good, and they dont have to deal with the weather conditions when they sleep. Services, thatny is why there are so many Homeless People in los angeles. They are not native to los angeles for the most part. They do not and will not accept an offer to come in. It is a fact that people want to consider when looking at the picture of chronic homelessness. Thank you. Sophia lee i agree that is one of the bigger issues, and we are addressing homelessness. How do you help people that dont want to be helped her dont even know they want help . Why is also another reason you do have to go to the individual basis and talk to these people. One of the things and having homelessness is walking onto the streets. Dont wait for people experiencing homelessness to come to you but go out onto the streets and talk to them. Talk to them and talk to them. Develop a trust and a friendship. Toe people eventually decide do housing. You convince them into that. Some people will never want housing. It is true that a lot of people are simply a little too comfortable living on the streets. I have that i have met very sad cases of people who were given opportunities, onceinalifetime opportunities to be housed, to be under a roof , to function like a normal , turn itth shelter down because of various issues like drug addiction or medical illness, and it is a sad case. That is one thing that makes homelessness a tough issue to solve. Host the final call comes from robert. Caller good morning. Sophia, you have a beautiful voice and a beautiful heart. I dont care what that other lady said. I think the mayor should be the springboard. He could do work with people like you. You have to do with your doing. We love you, ok. I am not homeless. My mother was. I think people like you are making a difference. Keep on going here in love you out here. You are like a rock to us. Cost less you and whoever your parents are among the rose a beautiful child. You will make you cry. Five. Sophia lee thank you. Host a nice way to end the interview. Any final thoughts . Sophia lee i want to conclude with this is that homelessness is not an issue, it is not just an issue. It is not just a crisis, cannot just be solved by money. Cannot just be solved by change of policy or just directing new houses. Erecting new houses. There are stories. There are some very good stories, fun stories, also tragic and sad stories. These are the stories that i because behind every homeless person is someone who was precious in the eyes of another. Behind every homeless person is a son or daughter who was loved and who is who has a unique story and personality and good character. Useally hope that more of and me included, that we look at the issue of homelessness in that way, that these are real human beings created in the image of god. Inherent dignity. I would like us to start their and look at homelessness not as an issue but as human beings who preserve deserve respect and compassion. Host thank you so much for your time this morning. Sophia lee thank you for having me. Host lets look at tomorrows program. The u. S. Justice Action Network will be here to discuss Jeff Sessions recent call for stricter guidelines. Then we get the future of the u. S. Iran relations following the election of print president rouhani. And the budget on the Education Department and policy. Tonight,gramming note we are running the congressman speeches around the night. You can watch on cspan or cspan. Org. You can listen for free with the cspan radio app. That will do it for todays program. Thank you for making washington journal a part of your morning. Have a great saturday. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] announcer 1 a look at some recent commencement speeches from around the country. First we will hear from actor and former governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, followed by former Vice President joe biden, and girls who code founder reshma saujani. Then hobby or gonzales and governor doug ducey and rick snyder. Actor and former california governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was the Commencement Speaker at the university of houston. He talked about the importance of helping others by focusing on the many people crucial to his own success as a bodybuilder, actor, and politician. This is 20 minutes. [applause] mr. Schwarzenegger thank you very much, thank you. [applause]