[dropcap size=big]A[/dropcap] city program that brought hundreds of hand-washing stations and portable toilets to the doorstep of dozens of encampments during the height of the pandemic, comes to an abrupt end. L.A. TACO has confirmed that all units city-wide are currently being pulled.
This comes after an L.A. TACO investigation last month revealed that the city failed to assess hand-washing stations daily during the first five months of the pandemic and vendors regularly failed to service units. Over the past 14 months, the city has spent millions of dollars on hand-washing stations and porta-potties. In May, Brian Swanson with the Department of General Services (the city department that manages contracts), told us that the contract for the units expires at the end of October 2021. Purchase orders under that contract have ceased.
The city has decided to end their unprecedented effort to provide basic services to encampments as the number of COVID-19 cases — largely fueled by the easily spreadable Delta variant — reported by the L.A. County health department have increased more than 500 percent in the last month and the percentage of coronavirus tests coming back positive has increased nearly 700 percent.
The county has reported more than 1,000 new coronavirus cases over the past seven consecutive days, numbers Los Angeles hasn’t sustained for more than a day since early March. Last week, L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti announced that he will leave his post as mayor early to accept a job as U.S Ambassador to India (pending confirmation from the U.S. Senate), abandoning Angelenos as they grapple with the ripple effects of the pandemic.