Link: How LA Failed to Stop Landlords From Turning Low-Cost Housing Into Tourist Hotels

Under the law, Verge was required to compensate the city for the loss of affordable housing by either building replacement units or paying into a fund for housing construction. In Verge’s case, that could have cost more than $10 million. But like many landlords, Verge did neither of those things, and the city Housing Department didn’t compel him to, even though the law provides for $250-per-day fines and jail time for violators.

How LA Failed to Stop Landlords From Turning Low-Cost Housing Into Tourist Hotels

Fifteen years ago Los Angeles passed a law to preserve residential hotels as housing of last resort. Now, amid the homelessness crisis, Capital & Main and ProPublica found some hotels may be violating that law by offering rooms to tourists.

Robin Urevich, Capital & Main, and Gabriel Sandoval, ProPublica, photography by Barbara Davidson for ProPublicaProPublica

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