LOS ANGELES, CA – A private, unarmed neighborhood group is becoming increasingly visible in Venice as residents and businesses pay for help addressing homeless encampments on or around their properties, drawing support from some community members while raising questions from advocates about oversight, accountability and whether the approach simply moves unhoused people elsewhere.
The group, known as Ghost Town, says it is not a licensed security company and does not operate as an armed patrol.
Instead, its founders describe the organization as a neighborhood-based mediation and conflict-resolution service whose members include former gang members, people in recovery from addiction and others with longstanding ties to Venice.
Residents who have hired the company say they turned to Ghost Town after experiencing recurring problems near their properties.
“We were having fires, we were having fights in the back of our alley,” resident Nate Daniel said.
Daniel said the group’s approach has been less confrontational than he expected.
“They really just stepped in and became really good advocates for conflict resolution,” he said.
Ghost Town co-founder Bobby Luna said the group relies heavily on personal relationships and familiarity with the neighborhood.
“Our families have been in Venice for a hundred years, we know everybody so we started acting as like mediators,” Luna said.
The group says its workers approach people living in encampments, attempt to establish communication and ask whether they need immediate assistance.
“We ask them if they need anything and if they do it’s usually food or some water,” Luna said.
Co-founder Ricky Myers said the group sometimes provides money but denied that payments are used to force people to leave.
“A lot of times if we do give people money, it’s just trying to help them out in the situation they are,” Myers said. “We are not paying them to leave or anything.”
Ghost Town signs have become increasingly common around parts of Venice as more property owners subscribe to the service.
Some local businesses say they have seen a noticeable decline in encampments around their properties since the group began working nearby.
People experiencing homelessness have also described mixed experiences with the organization.
One man said he had developed a relatively friendly relationship with a Ghost Town worker who periodically asks him to move.
“I used to get mad, but now I’m pretty good friends with one of the guys that tells me that I need to move around sometimes,” he said.
The model, however, has prompted criticism from homeless advocates who question both its effectiveness and its lack of formal public oversight.
Mel Tillekeratne, co-founder and executive director of The Shower of Hope, said moving people away from one property does not address the underlying causes of homelessness.
“All this is doing is moving one person to another place and what about the people who are not subscribers of Ghost Town?” Tillekeratne said.
He also raised concerns about accountability because the group does not operate as a state-licensed security company.
“Again, we don’t know the kind of tactics they use and they are not state licensed,” Tillekeratne said.
He argued that private efforts involving vulnerable people require particular scrutiny when there is no governmental agency directly supervising the interactions.
“That doesn’t mean we stoop down to tactics that borderline on harassment, or if this actually could be harassment,” he said. “We don’t know because nobody is holding Ghost Town or any other groups like this accountable.”
Ghost Town disputes suggestions that its workers physically intimidate or harass people.
Luna said employees are specifically instructed to disengage when an encounter becomes hostile.
“Our policy is if someone is irate and they’re having a bad day and they’re on drugs or they’re yelling at us, walk away,” he said.
One unhoused man also said he had not personally seen the group physically touch people.
“They don’t go around putting their hands on people, no, not that I’ve seen,” he said.
Ghost Town says its work can extend beyond asking people to relocate.
Luna said the group attempts to follow up with people it encounters and may help obtain clothing, treatment or other assistance.
“They come and we’ll buy them clothes, we send them to rehab, we’ll support them while they’re there,” Luna said.
The company has not released figures showing how many people it has referred into treatment, shelter or permanent housing.
That absence of outcome data is one of the major unanswered questions surrounding the model.
There is currently no publicly available figure showing how many people who interacted with Ghost Town ultimately entered permanent housing or completed a rehabilitation program.
Information reviewed by Street People indicates the private approach exists alongside a much larger publicly funded homelessness response system in Los Angeles.
The Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority coordinates the regional continuum of homeless services across most of Los Angeles County, including outreach, shelter and housing programs. LAHSA describes itself as the lead agency coordinating federal, state, county and city funding for programs serving people experiencing homelessness.
Residents seeking outreach for someone living unsheltered can also use LA-HOP, the countywide outreach-request system designed to connect people experiencing homelessness with outreach teams and services. LA-HOP specifically distinguishes outreach needs from emergencies or criminal activity, directing emergencies to 911 and illegal activity to law enforcement.
The City of Los Angeles has separately used its Inside Safe initiative to move people from street encampments into interim housing and eventually toward permanent housing.
Venice was one of the neighborhoods where Inside Safe began operating early in the program. In January 2023, city officials announced outreach around encampments near Sunset Avenue and Pacific Avenue, saying the program was intended to bring people indoors while preventing encampments from returning.
That public model differs fundamentally from the private service being offered by Ghost Town.
Inside Safe and LAHSA outreach are built around placement into shelter, interim housing or other services through publicly coordinated systems.
Ghost Town, by contrast, is paid directly by individual residents and businesses and operates independently from city government.
Council District 11, which represents Venice, confirmed that distinction.
Councilwoman Traci Park’s office said Ghost Town works with community members and stakeholders in parts of Venice but is not coordinated by the council office.
“Ghost Town is an organization that actively works with local community members and stakeholders in parts of Venice,” the office said. “We understand that some residents and local businesses value their presence in the neighborhood.”
The statement emphasized that the organization remains private.
“Ghost Town operates independently, and CD 11 does not coordinate or have any involvement with services they privately offer residents.”
The Council District 11 website separately directs constituents to city housing and service resources, underscoring the distinction between municipal services and privately contracted neighborhood efforts.
The underlying legal and practical situation can also depend on where an encampment is located.
Los Angeles city guidance distinguishes between encampments occupying the public right of way and those located on private property. City guidance for encampment complaints directs public-right-of-way concerns through city service channels while advising that encampments on private property are generally matters for the property owner.
That distinction helps explain why some Venice property owners have sought out a private service.
Yet it does not resolve the debate over what methods a private company should be permitted to use when interacting with people experiencing homelessness.
Supporters focus on immediate conditions around their homes and businesses: fires, fights, customer concerns and repeated encampments.
Critics focus on the person being moved and what happens afterward.
If an individual simply relocates to another block, advocates argue, the visible problem may disappear for one paying customer while remaining unresolved for the neighborhood or city as a whole.
Ghost Town says it tries to avoid that outcome by connecting people with assistance, but no independently verified data was provided showing how often those referrals result in housing or treatment.
The debate comes as Venice continues to sit at the center of Los Angeles’ broader struggle over homelessness, public space and neighborhood safety.
City officials have repeatedly used outreach and housing interventions in and around Venice, while Council District 11 has also pursued measures addressing large encampments and public-space impacts in Westside communities.
At the same time, residents and businesses continue to make individual decisions about what they believe is necessary to protect their properties.
For some, Ghost Town has filled a gap they felt public agencies were not addressing quickly enough.
For advocates, that very demand highlights the need for stronger public systems rather than an expansion of private neighborhood enforcement.
The exact size of Ghost Town’s current client base has not been disclosed.
It is also unclear how many people the group interacts with each week, how many eventually enter treatment or housing, or whether any independent agency systematically reviews complaints about its conduct.
Those unanswered questions are likely to remain central as the organization’s signs spread through Venice and more residents become familiar with its work.
For now, the group continues operating independently while public agencies maintain their own outreach and housing programs.
The tension between those two approaches — immediate private intervention versus publicly coordinated housing and services — is increasingly visible on the streets of Venice.
