A significant drop in the number of unhoused people in Venice has been promoted by city officials as proof that homelessness policies are working. But new findings from the RAND Corporation suggest that reductions in visible homelessness may have more to do with vehicle restrictions and enforcement than with actual housing or services.

According to the 2024 LA LEADS Annual Report from RAND, unsheltered homelessness in Venice fell by 22% over the past year. But the report found that this entire reduction was due to a decline in the number of people living in vehicles, not through housing placements or service expansion. “There were no meaningful Inside Safe actions near the LA LEADS Venice survey footprint in 2024,” RAND researchers noted. Meanwhile, the number of individuals sleeping entirely without shelter—on sidewalks, benches, or the ground—more than doubled in Venice and in Hollywood. RAND described this shift as creating “clinical, tactical, and strategic challenges” for service providers, as people without tents or vehicles are harder to find, harder to serve, and at greater risk of harm.

City data reveal that more than 1,300 oversized vehicle restriction zones have been created across Los Angeles, prohibiting RVs and other large vehicles from parking overnight—often in areas where people rely on their vehicles for shelter. These zones are established by councilmembers at their discretion and do not come with requirements to provide services or housing to the people they displace. Enforcement has led to roughly 1,200 citations per year, as well as towing and impoundments. Between 2018 and 2022, the city issued more than $678,000 in fines and towed 149 RVs, collecting less than half of the fines it levied. Los Angeles’ Department of Transportation does not maintain a centralized database of where these bans exist; the first public map was compiled by Controller Mejia’s office.

Councilmember Traci Park, who represents Council District 11 on the Westside of LA, has been one of the most aggressive proponents of these restrictions. Since March 2023, Park has introduced twelve separate motions establishing overnight oversized vehicle parking bans across seventy-nine street segments in her district, including one as recently as July 1st. These bans are enacted under LAMC 80.69.4, a law that imposes 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. parking restrictions on oversized vehicles without providing any relocation support, services, or access to shelter. Park is also seeking to expand legislation targeting vehicle dwellers by reestablishing the core elements of LAMC 85.02, a law the Ninth Circuit rejected in 2014 for being vague, discriminatory, and unconstitutionally cruel. At the same time, the city’s Safe Parking LA program, which is designed to offer secure overnight parking for people living in their vehicles, includes 15 sites, none of which allow RVs or other oversized vehicles. This means that people displaced by Park’s restrictions are not being sheltered or housed. They are simply being pushed from one block to the next, often accumulating new citations and risking the loss of their vehicles altogether.

A new report from the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy confirms the disruptive impact of these policies. Based on interviews with vehicle residents across West LA, the report Criminalizing Vehicle Residency in Los Angeles documents how enforcement-based strategies “routinely displace people, sever their access to services, and result in loss of critical property and infrastructure.” The authors found that many people live in RVs not by choice, but as a last resort after eviction, rent hikes, or the loss of a job or spouse. “People are not choosing to live in vehicles,” the report states. “They are choosing to avoid death on the street.” The study also notes that vehicle dwellers are not a fringe population but an integral part of Los Angeles’ working poor—employed, caregiving, and actively trying to survive. By criminalizing their shelter, the city is “replacing encampment visibility with vehicular vulnerability.” The effects of Park and other Councilmembers’ draconian approach are echoed in national studies. A report published in Shelterforce found that cities implementing anti-camping ordinances between 2007 and 2017 saw homelessness increase by 2% the following year, while cities that did not saw a 5% decrease. The study concluded that these ordinances “don’t keep people from living on the street” but instead force them to hide, making outreach harder and worsening outcomes.

In Venice, RAND’s findings make clear that while vehicle dwellings declined, rough sleeping surged. The report also found that 91% of unsheltered respondents said they wanted housing, but only 13% reported being offered permanent supportive housing. Offers of group shelter were more common but had a less than 50% acceptance rate, often due to safety concerns or inflexible requirements. Advocates and researchers increasingly argue that enforcement-first policies may create the appearance of progress while leaving the underlying crisis untouched, or even deepened. RAND’s report calls for expanding access to permanent housing and rethinking outreach to prioritize long-term trust-building over short-term removals. As long as the city continues to invest in towing, signage, and displacement rather than shelter and services, the numbers may continue to shift, but the crisis will remain.