Lamp Community permanently ends homelessness.

Based in the skid row area of Downtown Los Angeles, Lamp Community provides immediate housing and lifelong supportive services for homeless men and women living with severe mental illness. For 23 years, Lamp Community has improved health, built self-sufficiency, and awakened and nurtured the tools necessary for people to transform their lives.

Each night, nearly 74,000 homeless people in Los Angeles County seek shelter on streets, in encampments, or in vehicles. An estimated one-third to one-half of L.A’s homeless people struggle with severe mental illness, making mental illness, by far, the most serious health problem affecting the homeless.

Lamp Community’s philosophy is based on the belief that housing is a basic human right and that people living with mental illness should be integrated into our communities.

Lamp Community treats housing as a first step to recovery, not a reward for enrolling in mental health and drug addiction services. The premise is simple: success in treatment, and in all areas of life, is more likely when people have a stable home. Lamp Community permanently ends homelessness, improves health, and builds self-sufficiency among homeless men and women living with severe mental illness.