[Music]
all right los angeles county sheriff
alex
villanueva vowing to clear homeless
encampments from venice beach by july
4th
his announcement comes after a close
encounter on the venice boardwalk
when a homeless woman pulled out a knife
you're seeing this just feet away from
an l.a mayoral candidate launching his
campaign
here to react to los angeles county
sheriff alex villanueva
uh sheriff how did it get to this
well what got to this is year after year
of
counterproductive and irresponsible
decisions from
the board of supervisors the mayor of la
and the l.a counties or the l.a city
council each and every
person played a part in failing to
acknowledge the unfolding crisis that
gets getting bigger and bigger
and yet they're still applying the same
failed formula year after year
and somehow expecting to have a better
result it's insanity
so there was really an underclass that
lives in tents lives on the side of the
road in lean twos
and is now not asked to move right they
use
the street as their restroom uh and
that's really what the people in your
city have to deal with
exactly and uh they've handcuffed the
lapd
and told no you're not going to enforce
anything because we don't want to offend
anybody
and somehow in here i have a letter of
supervisor sheila kuhl she's a district
supervisor over that area
and if i were her i'd be embarrassed
just like councilman mike bonin
the two of those are singularly
responsible for the results in venice
and she says that she's responding to
counterproductive
deputy deployments in venice and i mean
i'm reading through this saying it's
just appalling she says that she's
deeply disturbed well
i'm deeply disturbed by people dying in
the streets face down in the gutter
i'm deeply disturbed disturbed that
venice is now
the destination of choice for homeless
throughout the entire nation
we're going to come there to enjoy the
fair weather the free services
and crowding out the needing homeless
people who are from la county
the mentally ill the ones with severe
substance abuse issues
those people are not getting the service
they need because now we're
just put up the welcome mat for the
entire nation's homeless
right there in venice so these aren't
people that couldn't pay the rent
these are people that are either
mentally ill or just want to live
off the grid and you guys not you
but the city council allows it so
thousands are coming
so who's happy about this who's looking
around and saying wow this is working
great
well there's one group that is very
happy we have an entire homeless
industrial complex
and this is all the 501c organizations
that are receiving
the money from the county and from the
city you have the
aclu with their attorneys making 400 000
a year representing all these special
interests
and then you have all the army of i
don't know what they call them social
workers
with clipboards that have been there for
years as the problem gets bigger and
then i have
supervisor kill claiming that
interrupting their good work
i mean the i don't know if it's just
this detachment from reality
and from responsibility is truly
frightening because it's an
unfolding humanitarian crisis and this
community is suffering
sheriff how do you feel about the calls
for you to resign what are you going to
do
whoa it's it's sad when you think about
it yesterday or day before yesterday we
started the largest
drug seizure and i think it's going to
be u.s history
when it's all said and done we're taking
in illegal marijuana grove by the by the
time
and which was putting the farmers up in
the high desert out of business and
ruining the communities up there
ruining the with the dispensaries down
here in the basin destroying lives
violent crime out of control wholeness
is firing out of control
and the best thing they could do is come
up with demanding my resignation
while i have a d.a who is not doing his
job
in endangering the lives of l.a county
resident
and he has their full support and
backing so
yeah so you pay high taxes to live in a
city that's overrun with crime and
homelessness
let's bring in lawrence jones and uh fox
and friends enterprise reporter
why don't you investigate the homeless
problem at venice beach you've been
listening to us talk
what's your assessment you hear the
sheriff's frustration well i think the
sheriff's headline right there
is a detachment from reality when you
provide the folks that are
on the streets they're narcan when they
drug overdose when you provide them
needles when you provide them a hot meal
every single day through time
sometimes three meals a day i mean one
of the
biggest misconception is that california
has a money problem to deal with this
crisis that's not true
they give a lot of money to these
programs to help folks get off the
street
not only are they helping them to get
drug and mental treatment
but they're also helping them to get in
halfway houses
a lot of those folks have decided to
reject those
programs because they don't like living
by their curfew they don't like getting
off of drugs
and it's quite frankly more comfortable
for them to be out there on the street
and that's never reported on brian i
tell you the people of los angeles
better hope you don't take them on that
push to
resign uh sheriff you're the only thing
uh keeping that city
uh that state from spiraling into utter
chaos
uh sheriff thanks for joining us this
morning i understand your frustration
now you got it thank you folks for just
keep spreading the word we got to turn
this around
absolutely and it's not just you it's
it's everywhere especially
up in san francisco too thanks so much
sheriff