Welcome to Los Angeles, homeless capital of the world.

Multitudes of youth have long been drawn to the Hollywood area of Los Angeles County seeking movie and music stardom.  Many of these youth come to Hollywood fleeing troubled home lives, only to have their dreams of stardom shattered by the reality of homelessness.

The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LASHA) noted in its 2007 report on homelessness in Los Angeles that, on any given night, over 10,000 children are homeless in Los Angeles, and 79 percent of them are unsheltered – that’s 7,998 youth who are sleeping in the streets of Los Angeles every night. The same report found that within Los Angeles County Service Planning Area (SPA) 4 (which includes the Hollywood area) 32 percent of the population is homeless — more than any of the other seven Los Angeles County SPAs.

Other youth shelters in the area have recently closed their doors due to the economic downturn leaving LAYN as one of three emergency shelters providing food, shelter and a healthy environment to runaway youth regardless of gender, sexual orientation, race, religion, etc.

Once on the streets, however, youth find themselves mired in a world of sexual predation, violence, and other ills.  For example, a 2000 report conducted by Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and the County of Los Angeles Department of Health Services estimated that among youth between the ages of 12 and 20 on the streets of Hollywood (including both shelter youth and homeless youth who may never enter a youth shelter), approximately 30 percent have engaged in survival sex, through which they exchange sex for food, money, drugs and/or shelter.  National Runaway Switchboard data suggests the situation has worsened since 2000. Among homeless and runaway youth served between 2000 and 2007, the number panhandling has increased by 51 percent, prostitution by 29 percent, and drug dealing by 59 percent.  These statistics are reinforced by data concerning LAYN’s own youth population.  Of all youth seeking shelter at LAYN in 2009, 45 percent at any one time admitted to engaging in prostitution or survival sex, as many as 98 percent at any one time admitted to prior drug and/or alcohol abuse, and approximately 15 percent reported intravenous drug use. Approximately 80 percent of youth in our programs are of minority descent, including 40 percent of African-American and 35 percent of Latino descent.