White people in the Los Angeles area received higher scores from a system that guides who receives priority for housing assistance, according to an investigation.

Analysis by The Markup of 130,000 Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority's (LAHSA) Vulnerability Index-Service Prioritization Decision Assistance Tool (VI‑SPDAT) surveys found that White people, notably those under 25, received scores considered 'high acuity' - or most in need - more often than Black people, a gap which persisted year over year. 

The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) had already planned to stop using the tool after a research team partnering with the agency found the tool had 'the potential to advantage certain racial groups over others.' 

In 2019, the LAHSA found that Black people tended to receive lower vulnerability scores despite their overrepresentation in Los Angeles’s unhoused population, something the LAHSA attributed to 'structural racism, discrimination, and implicit bias'. 

The findings called into question the accuracy and fairness of the system and similar systems.

Timeline ⏰

• 2010. The VI-SPDAT tool is created and begins to be adopted across the U.S.

• 2016. LAHSA begins using the tool as the core of its Coordinated Entry System (CES).

• 2018. An internal LAHSA committee first flags that Black residents are not exiting homelessness at the same rates as White residents.

• 2020. The creators of VI-SPDAT announce they will phase out the tool due to its limitations.

• 2023. The Markup publishes its investigation.

• 2024–2025. LAHSA begins transitioning to the "Los Angeles Housing Assessment Tool" (LA HAT) to replace the biased system.

Investigations, assessments, audits 👁️

• The Markup (2023). L.A.’s Scoring System for Subsidized Housing Gives Black and Latino People Experiencing Homelessness Lower Priority Scores

• The Markup (2023). How We Investigated L.A.’s Homelessness Scoring System

• The Markup (2023). Journalists: Investigate Homeless Vulnerability Scoring in Your City

• The Markup (2023). Los Angeles's Homelessness Scoring System investigation data

Research, advocacy 🧮

• Community Solutions (2023). These are not the droids you are looking for

• Racism and Technology Center (2023). Racist Technology in Action: Racial disparities in the scoring system used for housing allocation in L.A.

• C4 Innovations (2019). Coordinated Entry Systems Racial Equity Analysis of Assessment Data (pdf)

News, commentary, analysis 🗞️

• https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-02-28/black-latino-homeless-people-housing-priority-list-los-angeles

• https://crast.net/289370/racially-biased-scoring-system-helps-choose-who-gets-housing-in-la/