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LA Mayor Karen Bass speaks during a U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting on homelessness. | Photo courtesy of Mayor Karen Bass/X
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Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is scheduled to travel to Washington, D.C., Tuesday to attend the three-day U.S. Conference of Mayors Winter Meeting, where she will discuss the issue of homelessness and participate in various sessions.
The conference’s 92nd winter meeting will take place Wednesday through Friday at the Capitol Hilton with a pre-conference session Tuesday on Women Small Business Owners and Entrepreneurs.
Bass is expected to return to Los Angeles on Friday.
Conference President and Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve will welcome more than 250 mayors from cities with populations of 30,000 or more from across the nation to discuss challenges facing cities, including mental health, public safety, immigration, housing and homelessness, workforce development and infrastructure investment.
Last year, Schieve appointed Bass as chair of the conference’s Task Force on Homelessness. Bass also serves as a member of the conference’s Advisory Board.
Bass is set to moderate a forum Wednesday titled “Homelessness: Next Steps,” which will build on a meeting in Los Angeles in November, where mayors suggested several policy initiatives aimed at reducing homelessness.
Among several recommendations from mayors were calls for the federal government to increase housing vouchers, bolstering federal protections from eviction and more emergency rental assistance.
Bass is also set to speak earlier Wednesday at the opening plenary lunch in a discussion exploring effective models of reducing homelessness.
Long Beach Mayor Rex Richardson is set to moderate a discussion Thursday titled, “Bridging the Digital Divide in Our Cities With BEAD,” referring to the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program, which provides federal funding to expand high-speed internet access.
Later Thursday, Richardson is set to speak during a session on affordable housing and celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Community Development Block Grant.
The meeting will also feature appearances by high-ranking Biden administration officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, and congressional leaders.
This is the second consecutive week that Bass will be traveling out of the state. She went to Dallas to attend the funeral of former Rep. Eddie Bernie Johnson last Tuesday. Johnson served in the House for 30 years, including nearly 12 years with Bass, was the first nurse to serve in Congress, and first woman and African American to chair the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.
Mayors from 15 other cities in Los Angeles County have also registered for the meeting in addition to Bass and Richardson, along with three from Orange County, according to organizers.
The other Los Angeles County mayors who have registered are Ross Maza (Alhambra); Emmanuel Estrada (Baldwin Park); Jorgel Chavez (Bell Gardens); Dr. Julian Gold (Beverly Hills); Yasmine-Imani McMorrin (Culver City); Justin Massey (Hermosa Beach); Gabriel Quinones (La Puente); Ariel Pe (Lakewood); Jose Luis Solache (Lynwood); Joe Franklin (Manhattan Beach); Eddie De La Riva (Maywood); Scarlet Peralta (Montebello); Isabel Aguayo (Paramount); Phil Brock (Santa Monica); and George Chen (Torrance).
The Orange County mayors who have registered are Ashleigh Aitken (Anaheim); Susan Sonne (Buena Park) and Farrah Khan (Irvine).
The meeting will conclude with the mayors meeting in the White House on Friday.
