>Nearly six months after volunteers counted the L.A. region's homeless population, the results still haven't been released — and the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority won't say when they will be. Instead, the agency says it's waiting on the federal housing department to validate its data, a review it once expected to be done by May 30.

**Why it matters:** The annual count shapes how hundreds of millions of federal dollars get spent in the county with the largest unhoused population in the country. It also drives policy and politics. The last two counts showed homelessness falling, a drop L.A. Mayor Karen Bass is running on for reelection.

**Why now?** LAHSA sent its data to HUD on April 30 and said the review would take about a month. Two months past that, neither agency will say whether it's finished. Meanwhile, HUD suspended LAHSA from federal grant activity in June over alleged mismanagement. LAHSA then sued, and a judge paused the suspension until an Aug. 6 hearing. HUD says nothing it has done stops L.A. from publishing its homeless count results.

**The backstory:** Last year, LAHSA broke precedent and rushed out preliminary numbers in March, weeks before county leaders voted to strip it of more than $300 million. A HUD review last year, though, found small errors in LAHSA's data. This year, interim CEO Gita O'Neill said the agency will wait for federal sign-off before releasing anything "to ensure total data integrity."

[LAist] Why hasn't LA released results of this year's homeless count?