LOS ANGELES — Last November, the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority announced a reimagined approach to their winter shelter program, that would use hotel and motel vouchers to get people inside during severe weather events, including freezing cold temperatures, flood warnings and major rainstorms. 

The program frees up an additional 500+ beds for outreach workers to access for their clients, in addition to the nearly 190 that are already in place at LAHSA’s six shelter sites.

A team of outreach workers with LAHSA’s Lancaster branch allowed Spectrum News to join them on Feb. 23, as they worked to get some of their clients into hotel and motel rooms using the voucher program. They were able to get six people indoors on a day when temperatures dipped into the mid-30s, freezing cold winds whipped through the region and neighboring areas of the Antelope Valley saw significant snowfall.

Outreach workers said the winter shelters in Lancaster have been full for weeks, and even with the additional beds they can access through the augmented winter shelter program, they still need more.