I don’t know about LA. But the homeless numbers have stayed pretty consistent for decades with a slight increase due to COVID. But we are seeing much more homeless in the subways, parks and Times Square. The reason we are seeing them now as opposed to pre-COVID days is that our republicans Logan mayor at the time campaigned on “cleaning up the streets” and “fixing the homeless problem”. He didn’t fix anything though, he forced the homeless into “less desirable” areas of nyc, bringing the home values of already struggling neighborhoods down even more. During COVID our homeless was freezing to death and dying from the elements because restrictions in the shelters prevented many of them access, so the governor had to open the subways etc so they were protected from the elements. If our repi local mayor (Giuliani) and Republican governor (Pataki) at the time actually did something productive to fix the problem instead of just hiding the problem away from tourists, we wouldn’t be where we are at now.