As homelessness rises, families balk at living downtown [SCPR.org]

Alisa Rivera says, in many ways, downtown Los Angeles is more family-friendly than ever. Pershing Square recently got new playgrounds. The downtown charter school kicked off its third year. The re-opening of Clifton's gives parents a fun, cafeteria-style place to take the kids.

So why is her family on the verge of moving out?

"There's a big explosion in homelessness," Rivera, 49, said. "There's been an increase in severely mentally ill people, people who have substance abuse issues and aggressive panhandling and aggressive behavior, in general. Walking down the street has become really fraught."

The latest homeless count shows that L.A.’s homeless population has risen 12 percent in two years. Police have tied that increase to growing rates of street crime, particularly downtown, which has the highest concentration of homeless in its Skid Row neighborhood. Homeless service providers like Mike Alvidrez of the Skid Row Housing Trust say poverty is the worst they've seen.

[For more of this story, written by Josie Huang, go to http://www.scpr.org/news/2015/...k-at-living-in-dtla/]