A House subcommittee has summoned Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass to testify in Washington next month over the alleged misuse of more than $1 billion in federal homelessness funds.
Rep. Tim Burchett, 59, the Tennessee Republican who chairs the Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency, set the hearing for Sept. 15 at 11 a.m. In Room 2154 of the Rayburn House Office Building. The panel is demanding documents from Bass’ office by Sept. 14 — one day before she would appear — covering records from Jan. 1, 2020, to the present on LAHSA’s internal controls, the use of federal homelessness funds, and communications between the mayor’s office, the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, the City Council and the LA County Board of Supervisors.
“Because Los Angeles officials have not adequately protected federal taxpayer dollars, it appears that many nonprofits to which those funds have been allocated are not using them for their intended purpose,” Burchett wrote to Bass. The letter, obtained by the California Post, formally invited her to the hearing titled “Fixing Fraud and Failure in Federally Funded Homelessness Services.”
LAHSA, a joint city-county agency, has received more than $1 billion in federal funding since 2021, including $220 million in 2024 alone. The city and county share oversight of those federal dollars, with Bass and the LA City Council collectively appointing half of LAHSA’s governing board while county supervisors appoint the other members.
The subcommittee pointed to a Department of Housing and Urban Development inspector general investigation into LAHSA’s handling of federal funds. That probe has identified alleged “repeated false statements” and failures involving financial management, internal controls and safeguards against conflicts of interest. In June, HUD suspended further federal funding to LAHSA until officials could demonstrate adequate safeguards were in place. A federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s cuts in August.
The panel highlighted specific cases that have drawn scrutiny, including a $2.1 million contract signed by former LAHSA CEO Va Lecia Adams Kellum with Upward Bound House — the employer of her husband. Kellum had previously told LAist she had recused herself from matters involving her husband’s employer, but public records later showed she personally authorized the contract. LAHSA said the contract had “inadvertently ended up” in front of her.
The committee also cited 1736 Family Crisis Center, which has received more than $36 million in federal grants since 2008, including at least $25 million through LAHSA since 2021. The organization’s CEO, Carol Adelkoff, received $1.6 million in total compensation over two years while living in Hawaii, according to the letter. The panel noted Adelkoff received $742,181 in 2024 compensation and $907,923 the previous year, including a $495,000 bonus. It compared that figure with the median annual pay of leaders at 16 comparable Los Angeles-area nonprofits, which it said was $159,737.
California’s homelessness crisis provides the backdrop for the congressional probe. The state has around 182,000 homeless people, including about 73,000 in Los Angeles County and more than 45,000 in the city, a 3.4% increase from the previous year, according to HUD data.
The DOGE subcommittee operates under the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, the chamber’s principal oversight committee with broad authority to investigate “any matter” at “any time.”
Bass’ office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The hearing will take place in Washington, DC.