The Homeless Industrial Complex: Fraud in Plain Sight with Samantha Nussbaum

Summary

The Fame Game with Heidi & Spencer

Episode: The Homeless Industrial Complex: Fraud in Plain Sight with Samantha Nussbaum

Date: February 19, 2026
Host(s): Spencer Pratt (Heidi absent due to illness)
Guest: Samantha Nussbaum
Runtime covered: ~00:32 – 59:02

---

Episode Overview

In this revealing and hard-hitting episode, Spencer Pratt interviews attorney and grassroots activist Samantha Nussbaum about systemic corruption and alleged fraud within Los Angeles’ homeless services sector. Drawing on her firsthand investigation into the Cheviot Hills shelter deal involving the Weingart Center and city government, Samantha discusses how misuse of public funds, lack of transparency, and inside deals are perpetuating the so-called “homeless industrial complex”—with eye-popping sums spent and almost nothing to show for it.

This conversation pulls back the curtain on the machinery behind LA’s homelessness response, showing how both seniors and the unhoused are the casualties of politics and profit-seeking, while public resources are wasted and accountability is scarce.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. How Samantha Got Involved & The Backstory

• Samantha’s personal stake: Grew up and lives in LA, concerned by city mismanagement, especially after surprise plans to convert a Cheviot Hills senior home into a homeless shelter came to light ([02:12]).
• Initial shock & action: Neither Samantha nor her neighbors were notified about the project; her and her husband (also an attorney) filed public records requests, uncovering 7,000+ pages of city documents ([02:12-03:30]).
• Escalating to authorities: Compiled findings into a memo to the US Attorney’s office; soon, the FBI contacted her and initiated an open investigation ([03:30-05:00]).
• Community organizing: Founded the Integrity Project to formalize local opposition and push for transparency ([05:00-06:30]).

“I didn’t even know what [a public records request] was at the time… now we have over 7,000 pages of documents.” — Samantha, 02:37

---

2. Anatomy of a Corrupt Deal

• Evicting seniors for profit: The plan involved displacing vulnerable seniors for a project many saw as a thinly disguised cash grab ([07:29, 20:00]).
• The ‘Homekey’ Funding Structure: Federal funds are given to cities via programs like Homekey and Project Roomkey, supposedly for affordable housing, but the processes are often bypassed ([10:26]).
• Inside job & pre-selection: Mayor’s office allegedly hand-picked the site, funding, and operators—before any public process ([10:26-12:30]).
• The middleman flip: Instead of directly buying the property for $11M, the city paid $27.3M via a middleman (Steven Taylor), with secretive NDA clauses and no real negotiation. The middleman was later arrested ([14:37, 16:46]).

“There’s even an email that says Mayor Bass gave a verbal agreement for the $30 million purchase…this was supposed to be submitted by an applicant…and they’re pre-approving the sites, the money, the operator.” — Samantha, 11:39

• No accountability or oversight: The required appraisals were faked or ignored, with the final “value” matching the available budget rather than true market price ([16:46-19:18]).

“No one has seen an appraisal…They determine this is fair market value. The fair market value is $11 million, right. It’s in escrow for $11 million…instead it’s just the grant maximum.” — Samantha, 16:46

• Construction budget games: Line items are inflated to use up all available funds (e.g., $300k just for common room furniture), renovations balloon from $2M to $8M with no explanation ([19:27]).

---

3. Systemic Failure, Not Isolated Incident

• More than one site: The Cheviot Hills case is just the tip of the iceberg; this formula is repeated across the city, with estimates of at least 10 similar projects run by Weingart ([39:47-40:00, 39:52]).
• No incentives to actually help: Shelters receive $100 per unit per day, regardless of occupancy, creating zero incentive to actually house homeless people ([24:33]).

“There’s zero incentive to put anybody in the building because they get the money whether it’s full or whether it’s empty.” — Samantha, 23:48

• No transparency or recourse: Local officials like Councilmember Katie Yaroslavsky’s office give platitudes but avoid or dismiss public concerns, repeat “misinformation” accusations, and misrepresent their own legal authority ([24:43-28:31, 46:44]).

“She insists the shelter is only for people over a certain age…but the underlying documents prohibit all of those kind of restrictions. And we showed them to her…no accountability or no engagement.” — Samantha, 24:43

• Political pay-to-play: Host and guest discuss (speculatively, for legal reasons) how campaign donations and future political aspirations might drive the pattern ([29:02]).

---

4. Oversight Responses & Obstacles

• Media silence & political cover: Most media outlets ignored Samantha’s story and documentation, likely out of fear of losing access or due to institutional alliances with city officials ([56:50, 57:57]).

“For a year and a half… I’ve been reaching out…it feels like on a daily basis to so many media outlets, magazines, newspapers…begging…to come share this story…No one has let me or accepted the chance to hear all about this corruption until you.” — Samantha, 56:50

• Legal and investigative avenues: FBI and IRS criminal investigation divisions are now involved; hosts discuss how overlapping investigations might yield actual consequences ([31:31]).

• Integrity Project and community action: The group is self-funding legal efforts and raising awareness via social media (@the_integrity_project) and ongoing advocacy ([49:00-49:40]).

---

5. The Human & Policy Cost

• Displacement’s impact: Senior residents were uprooted with little warning, some suffering severe negative consequences, while shelter construction drags on ([34:06]).
• No net gain: Years and $60M later, not a single homeless person has been helped by the project; LA’s overall homelessness crisis continues unchecked ([33:56, 42:17]).

“$60 million of that has been spent—now, three years later, a homeless person hasn’t changed one of their lives.” — Spencer, 33:57
“It’s believable; that’s why you see so many homeless people. Because they’re spending $60 million, years go by and nobody got one of the $400,000 rooms.” — Spencer, 42:17

---

6. What's Broken & How to Fix It

• No city ownership: City doesn’t own these buildings, so reclaiming them or changing operators is nearly impossible ([44:15, 46:23]).
• Needed reforms: Spencer and Samantha outline obvious steps: city must own the property, have genuine oversight, enforce contracts, and terminate deals when mismanagement or fraud is found ([44:15, 46:23]).
• False promises: Political leaders repeatedly claim powers they don’t have, such as shutting down operators, to placate upset constituents ([46:44]).

---

7. The Broader Context – Public Trust & The “Homeless Industrial Complex”

• Motivations: The city’s “bed quotas” are more important to officials than actual help, leading to perverse incentives ([42:28, 53:07]).
• Lack of safeguards: The “housing first” approach, which mandates housing without mandatory sobriety or treatment, leads to community concerns about safety and accountability ([53:02-55:01]).

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “It’s not their money, so they don’t care. And if anything, spending the money helps their political careers and their relationships.” — Spencer, 33:18
• “Every day, the money is just being drained away from taxpayers’ pockets because construction is ongoing.” — Samantha, 47:44
• “Our Integrity Project has an Instagram account… because again, you see, it’s so specific. Sometimes I’ll post one email and she’s like, look at that. This mismanagement needs to be seen by other people.” — Samantha, 48:56
• “People will argue… she’s upset that they’re trying to put homeless people in her community. But no, you should be upset because that’s your tax money that they’re stealing. And not only that, they’re not putting homeless people in a space for years where they could have used that money way more efficiently.” — Spencer, 49:34

---

Key Timestamps and Segments

• [02:12] - Samantha recounts the origins of her investigation in Cheviot Hills.
• [05:40] - First major arrest and the beginning of a federal inquiry.
• [10:26] - Explaining the Homekey program and its loopholes.
• [14:37] - Naming the middleman in public record: Steven Taylor.
• [16:46] - No appraisals, no due diligence, and budget-matching “costs.”
• [24:33] - The perverse incentive to leave rooms empty for ongoing revenue.
• [28:31] - Officials’ refusal to answer fraud concerns; evasion and misrepresentation.
• [31:31] - Spencer suggests bringing in IRS criminal investigation for parallel action.
• [39:52] - Scale of the problem: at least 10 similar deals, at $30-$60 million each.
• [44:15] - What reform would look like if Samantha ran city oversight.
• [46:44] - The myth that local politicians can “replace operators.”
• [48:56] - The Integrity Project’s campaign for transparency.
• [56:50] - Media blackout and the importance of independent platforms.

---

Conclusion

This episode unearths an unsettling pattern of financial abuse, official obfuscation, and civic failure in Los Angeles’ approach to homelessness—where transformative sums of money vaporize through broken systems, while the vulnerable, both elderly and homeless, gain nothing. Samantha Nussbaum’s work—supported with exhaustive documentation and steely legal rigor—exposes not only a single scandal but a potentially city-wide, systemic betrayal of the public trust. As Spencer vows to amplify the story, the takeaway is clear: only relentless citizen action, oversight, and fearless journalism will end the “homeless industrial complex”—and cities like LA must reckon with who truly benefits from their spending.

---

“Boom. We are the media now here at the Fame Game.”
— Spencer, 59:02

Transcript

[A]

New Year, new me. Cute. But how about New Year, new money? With Experian, you can actually take control of your finances. Check your FICO score, find ways to save and get matched with credit card offers, giving you time to power through those New Year's goals. You know you're going to crush start the year off right. Download the Experian app Based on FICO Score 8 model offers an approval not guaranteed. Eligibility requirements and terms apply subject to credit check which may impact your credit scores. Offers not available in all states. Experian.com for details Experian

[B]

oh no.

[C]

That's all God's time.

[D]

Welcome back to the Fame Game. My gorgeous pop star global superstar wife could not be here today because I gave her the flu. Don't worry, I don't have it anymore. But I did have it coming back from my incredible book tour in New York and and she should have had more. Vitamin C was the takeaway. So she will not be here. But we have a legendary guest who I'm so excited about because trending all across America right now is fraud. Whether you're actually doing the fraud and you want to point the finger at somebody else is doing the fraud because you want to be like, hey, they're doing fraud also, it's trending. So thank God we have a citizen here that has spent her own free time exposing the fraud and corruption in her community. Welcome Samantha, to the Fame Game podcast.

[C]

Thank you. I'm so happy to be here.

[D]

We are so excited because one thing I've noticed with your we'll call it journalism because you know, investigating is it's so detail oriented to the point where a lot of your information helped lead to the federal investigation and take down some legit criminals. So just want to shout out Susan Collins who is an investigative reporter and I think her posting your stuff popped on my feed. She wasn't able to be here today, but shout out Susan, thanks for all your hard work and working with geniuses here. So please give everyone the backstory on how you ended up here on the Fame Game.

[C]

Thank you. Thank you. And it's been a long journey to try to get attention to the story. So I'm so grateful to have this chance to talk to you about it. I'll give you a really high level picture of what's going on and then sort of how I got here and then we can get maybe into the details because the story is so juicy and complex and the public really doesn't know any about that yet, but I think deserves to know. So I grew up in Los Angeles. I was born and raised here, and in the last several years, just became more disappointed with the condition of the city and sort of how it's being managed. And then going back to May 2024, back in time, a media story comes out about this homeless shelter to be opened in our neighborhood in Cheviot Hills. Mayor Bass and our councilwoman, Katie Araslovsky, thought it was a great idea to open a homeless shelter in a residential neighborhood, walking distance to a school where a senior assisted senior living center was operating, so seniors would have to be evicted. This seemed bad enough. The news story came out. The neighborhood had no idea about this at all. No one. Everyone was shocked. And behind all of those facts, though, was this underlying scheme where there was inside deals and what we have uncovered to be what appears to be really serious corruption. So when the story came out, people started researching and looking into what happened. And my husband and I are both attorneys, and we live on the same street as the shelter, so our personal interest in it was heightened and we started researching and it looked pretty terrible what we were finding. So we placed public records requests. I didn't even know what that was at the time until someone told me I should look into this. We now have over 7,000 pages of documents inside city emails, contracts, agreements. Started reading through all of it and eventually wrote a memo, sent it to Bill Asale's office, the U.S. united States Attorney for the Central District of California. He created a task force to investigate homeless fraud spending. So I sent the information to his office. And then the next day, two FBI agents emailed me and said they were going to be my points of contact going forward. They wanted to open up an investigation and could they come to our house and interview me. So all of a sudden we had the FBI coming over to the house. I didn't know what I should do. Did I serve them food? When I have donuts or coffee, this is the first thing that ran through my mind. They did not eat any of the food that I offered them, but they were very nice. And I went through all my materials with them, and they said they'd be opening an investigation, they'd be my points of contact, but they couldn't send me any updates. So since then I've been sending them more thoughts as I collect them and whatnot. But that was sort of the backstory. And if you Fast forward to October 2025, we can get into the transaction now. But a player in the transaction underlying the acquisition. So this homeless shelter is arrested.

[E]

So.

[C]

So now it's real. Right before we were sleuthing around and talking to the FBI. Now there's an actual act of federal investigation. Not only is the person arrested, but there's an announcement that the feds are actively investigating the Weingart Center. Who is this alleged nonprofit? Humongous operator of homeless shelters. Who is the owner, future operator of the site and its CEO, who is a former California state senator, Kevin Murray. He's since been put on leave by the organization along with another executive due to the investigation. But we started this nonprofit we called the Integrity Project, to highlight and formalize our neighborhood's opposition. We're really a grassroots effort, and nobody knows the details of the story. And we are still fighting it because it is still being renovated. The deal was approved in 2023 under Karen Bass emergency homelessness declaration. So it can bypass public review and bypass all these other standard rules and allow secrecy, essentially. So it's still been renovated. So, like three years later at this point, I mean, the corruption is on a daily basis. I go down every day and I see. And there's people working, and they're spending taxpayer money every day. And we've been trying to get the city to terminate the project and the underlying contracts, but they won't. They're ignore all warnings of fraud, determined to push this thing forward. So our group is on this mission to protect our neighborhood and also expose the story, because again, it's still not really. It hasn't really been broken down in detail yet. So that's kind of like how we got here. But are you ready to hear about the actual transaction?

[D]

Yeah, I mean, let's rewind all the way. Just the fact that they kick the senior citizens out of there just for this plan is just shows you the level of, oh, we are housing senior citizens here. Let's kick them out and do a whole scam. And for homeless, it's crazy.

[C]

And there was a lot of attempt at covering up even that. And now that we have the emails, we see folks in Mayor Bass's office and and city council are emailing about this, saying families might get upset. Who's gonna be in charge of social when the families get upset? When this gets goes public and everyone goes silent? No, Weingart should communicate and engage. We're not getting feedback that Weingart wants to engage. Someone else needs to engage. And you just see the emails that nobody wants to be accountable for this. And it's a big part of the story that really no one has focused on.

[D]

It just shows you, though, why she doesn't want to give up her fire department emails for the Palisades fire. Because it's probably the same thing, like who's dealing with the optics. 12 people burned alive. Should the fire department PR. It's just nobody wants to talk about humans. Like they're just pawns in their game.

[C]

Absolutely. And in this case, the emails are the most interesting part. And there's, you know, this deal all in ends up being $60 million of taxpayer funds. And I would say there's a thousand pages of emails where nobody knows who's paid what yet, how much has been paid, how much. It's still Nescro, what was authorized, what do we do with it? Nobody knows what to do. The incompetence is just mind blowing.

[D]

What's so wild? And we'll go up to date with the transactions, but we're just talking about one spot that you uncovered in your neighborhood. And that's what, you know, people keep on saying to me, oh, you only know about the fire. And I'm like, no. But I learned is if they're doing this with 12 people burning alive, they're all this corruption and lies. What are they doing all across the city? And that's just everywhere yours, one building. How many of these like Winegard s, how many times do they kick home with or senior citizens out of other buildings and taken over because they can make all this money?

[C]

Senior housing is not profitable, I've learned. And it's an easy target for these big buyouts. And yeah, this is, I think that this is a blueprint really for a lot of the homeless fraud spending that uses the same type of funding structures that happened here. And it should be used as a map for across the city, most likely the county, to of what's how things are being approved, you know, behind closed doors, just to give money away.

[D]

So that map, your list you posted yesterday with the steps, I don't think you can probably recite everyone by heart, but roughly a rough version of those steps.

[C]

Right. Okay, so that's a great place to start. This was a project called homekey, but there's other ones like it. There's a project room key. Home key itself had many funding rounds and, and distribution. So it starts with this federal fund and the money's essentially given to cities and then the mayor in mayor's offices, in this case Mayor Bass, has this amount of money to disperse somehow towards housing. And they create these programs and they're supposed to be rules and process in place. They even publish them. People are supposed to apply to be eligible for the grants. And they're supposed to score themselves on their proposed sites and expertise in running these facilities. And there's deadlines and elimination rounds and on paper. But it does not seem that this is really being done in practice. It appears like this is really a lot of prearranged, again, inside deals with favoritism, where in this case, the mayor's office really appears to have handpicked the site, knew in advance the amount of funding that would be available. There's even an email that says Mayor Bass gave a verbal agreement for the $30 million purchase essentially to the Los Angeles Housing Department, knowing it would be available. There's an email for someone in her office saying, we're sharing the Shelby site to use with the 47 million. I mean, this was supposed to be submitted by an applicant for. For reasons and then scoring themselves. And they're pre approving the sites, the money, the operator who's going to get it, and then making it look like it was in this formal process. Then they take the max grant value that they can give away, essentially the so much money, millions and millions of taxpayer dollars. And it's awarded to, in this case, Weingart, to go get the building. There's no negotiation, right? You maybe I can get a good deal on the building. Like that doesn't happen. They take the max amount. In this particular case, it's extra crazy because he doesn't just. He, Kevin Murray, the CEO of Weingart. Weingart doesn't take $30 million and go offer it to the person who owns the building to buy it, which would make sense. Maybe instead he goes to somebody else who doesn't own the building. There's a middleman in this transaction. So they go to this guy doesn't own the building, and this guy gets sent out to buy the building for as little as he can. So he opens escrow for $11 million, $11.2 million. Pretty much simultaneously, Weingart center and this middleman sign a purchase agreement for $27.3 million. It's contingent on the first deal closing and it's all prearranged. So when the media articles came out, it sounded like there was this big property flip, which sounded bad enough that it caught attention, but it was all prearranged. And the purchase agreement with the middleman and Weingart contains really robust confidentiality provisions. It says they're not to disclose the name of the middleman to the press, to anybody, specifically the press. It names the LA Times And Real Deal and gives other examples. This seems to me really concerning for a transaction that's using public funding to have such robust NDA clauses. Essentially. It also requires that the building be delivered empty. So they're wiping their hands clean of evicting the seniors because they have someone else to do it for them. Essentially. This huge amount of money. First of all, the $60 million is still who knows where, right? Like the gain. We don't think that the middleman just kept it all. But that's for the FBI to find.

[D]

Is the middle man's name? We're not LA Times. Do you. Are we allowed? Is that in the public record?

[C]

It is in the public record. His name is Steven Taylor. He was the one arrested. That kind of revived the neighborhood's motivation.

[D]

I thought the guy arrested was the guy in Brentwood.

[F]

That's the this episode is brought to you by Redfin. You're listening to a podcast, which means you're probably multitasking, maybe even scrolling home listings on Redfin, saving homes without expecting to get them. But Redfin isn't just built for endless browsing. It's built to help you find and own a home with agents who close twice as many deals. When you find the one, you've got a real shot at getting it. Get [e-mail], own the dream.

[G]

When you're a pro, you gotta do a little bit of everything. A little a little, and even a little a little. And it helps to have something that works as hard as you do. That's why Valspar has durable, high coverage paint for every job. Every time made. For more Valspar pros, head to Lowe's today and talk to a pro rep about saving time and money on your next job with Valspar. Signature paint exclusions apply. See valsparpro.com for details.

[D]

Different.

[C]

He lived in Brentwood at the time of the arrest. But there's recently another Brentwood real estate developer arrested for homeless fund.

[D]

That's a different case.

[C]

Different, yes. And so the money's just for no, because there's no oversight on once it's given sort of where it goes. So in this case, so they've got this purchase agreement right? When it goes through the approval process on the city side, there's all these steps the housing department recommends and then there's a CAO level recommends. City council gets to vote. They all vote yes. And then Mayor Bass signs yes. This is all in the whole funding package. It's a $30 million acquisition, $20 million renovation budget to renovate A existing senior home to become a homeless shelter. 20 million no site assessments and then an operating budget on top of that. So it's about $60 million.

[D]

Sorry, how many people are they saying you're going to go?

[C]

78. It's like the purchase price comes out to about $400,000 per unit. And if you count the renovation and the operating, it's more like $750,000 per per unit to do this. But when all this is approved, there's no appraisal. And there's a requirement in the homekey program on paper that they have appraisals. No one has seen an appraisal. Appraisals come later. But they determine this is fair market value. The fair market value is $11 million, right. It's an escrow for $11 million. Isn't that fair market value is what someone's willing to to spend on a property but instead it's just the grant maximum is that we know it's used to set this so there's no appraisal later. An appraisal is produced to be included in the paper trail. Essentially when the appraisal comes. There's so many problems with names Steven Taylor as the owner. Well through his entity at the time, his llc, he's not the owner. So they ignore the fact that there's a different owner. It omits the fact that the building is currently in escrow for 11.2 million. It says it has not sold in three years. And the home key rules on appraisals state that you must include any then ongoing escrow. And they don't. The appraisal company shortly thereafter is federally blacklisted. Blacklisted from federally backed mortgages. So they become under investigation for different matter. So it's like issue upon issue, it just continues the after the appraisal they then come up with a construction budget. It is. This is actually really. You might find it entertaining is probably not the right word but seeing that you are around all this proposed construction right now, it is almost to the dollar, the amount that's left in their funding pool. So in what cases does somebody go get a proposal on construction and it comes out to be exactly the amount of money you had left to spend in your bank account on your project. And they're like never does that ever happen.

[D]

They just know exactly how much money is there and they go to lunch and they figure out who gets every bit of the cut and how they can keep the most of it.

[C]

Right. They create this budget and then this is in the Documents, Right. So, like, if anyone were doing diligence, they would see it. But no one's reading this at this city. I'm reading it because I got all the documents and time. I don't have time, but I have interest, so I'm reading them. There is a line item in the construction budget for $300,000 for the common room furniture at the homeless shelter. I mean, like, you can't, you can't make these things up. There's so many crazy things on this. They've approved it.

[D]

But back to, back to. They had a common room for the seniors. Sure, these were, these lovely seniors. Didn't have a couch.

[C]

Sure, there was a couch, I imagine. I don't know. You know, they emptied the building. But then, no, I'm saying, yeah, of

[D]

course they should have just left, right, Left the first. They're going to kick out the seniors, put it exactly how it was. The seniors were living.

[C]

Right. So this, this, the construction budget, the first round of it had a 2 million dollar estimate for just the hard costs on the development. And then it changes to 8 million later. No one says anything about it. It's. They just have that much money left in their budget is what it seems. And then Karen Bass allegedly called Steven Taylor begging for the building. This is what has been told to. He told this to a number of people in our community and neighbors when the story broke that he was in escrow or looking at the building. And she called him personally saying they had to have that site. What, how much money did he want for it? And you know, I can't verify whether exactly that happened or how it was said, but it's a story that's been told to a lot of people. He also said that Newsom called him as well. And, you know, to me it's concerning because mayors are not, and governors are not supposed to act as brokers on deals. They have other roles to play within certain confines of their authority. And it appears to be overstepping those boundaries, in my opinion. So there's, there's layers like that and what's going on, there's just these hidden transaction steps. So the building is being. The seniors get eviction notices in August 2023, at some point thereafter, Karen Bass appoints Kevin Murray to this agency board. And you picked up on this when you, when you posted something about this story. She appoints him to the board of this homeless agency. So now he's on the other side of the transactions because Weingart's getting all this money from the city for a variety of deals. And now he's on a board that's in charge of approving funding for homelessness. While he's on the board, Weingart submits and two more extensions on the project deadlines. They're essentially amendments to the funding contracts, which appears to be a conflict of interest, at least in my understanding, so that you've got that going on. And then there's many other layers where entity names are changed. The middleman uses an LL creates forms an LLC where the name is almost identical to the name of the long term owner. So the long term owner LLC hands or group onto it. So someone who's slipping through the documents might not know he exists. Lots of steps taken to hide what is going on. But then I think going back to your question before about yesterday, the document I posted, primer on how to use $60 million and not house a single homeless person, went through this. You know, pretend you create a program where you have rules and then don't follow the rules and give away a lot of money essentially, and don't use appraisals and create fake fair market values. And. And this is what appears to be going on. The operating budget is based on $100 per room per day, regardless of if anybody's in the room. So that hasn't been released yet, as far as we know, because the building isn't ready to be operated. But if it were to be released, that would be $3 million per year. And there's zero incentive to put anybody in the building because they get the money whether it's full or whether it's empty. So like this is what I mean about a blueprint around the city and the County Board of Supervisors are approving deals like this. More deals like this within the city, within home Key specifically. That does not seem like the appropriate use of public funds.

[D]

I mean, that's insane, you know, so like you said, there's no incentive. If they're getting the money, no matter what, they could just all be hanging out.

[C]

There's no incentive. And then also there's no transparency. The neighborhood was kept in the dark. There was. None of this was revealed to the neighbors in advance. When we found out, we started sort of this concerned citizen campaign of writing letters. So many letters were in to Katie or Oslosky's office, to Kara Bass office, to Newsom, all the housing agencies. Katie's office responded and I'll explain that. But none of the other representatives or their offices replied ever to a single email, ever. We weren't just complaining we were revealing concerns of fraud. You know, fraud is fraud, right? You said fraud is trendy, fraud is serious. And these were real concerns about, you know, did you know there was this double transaction? And why would you pay $27 million for a building in escrow for $11 million and who kept the profit? And questions like that, and nobody answers them. And it starts, you know, you start wondering what's worse, the deal or now being informed of the deal and you don't do anything about it. They don't care. They want to ignore it. They want to open it. Katie Eraslavski's office has had several meetings with our group and other neighbors. We've had small meetings in her office. We've had a large neighborhood zoom with almost 200 people. And she does not care about any of the concerns that we've raised. She rather continues to express these rules about how the shelter will be operated that are not legally enforceable, but she insists that they are. So she insists the shelter is only for people over a certain age, over age 55, that they'll restrict drugs and alcohol, criminal background checks, but the underlying documents prohibit all of those kind of restrictions. And we showed them to her. This is like a rational conversation. I was in an office. There were six of us and her team. But you can't do that here. I brought you the loan agreement, you know, and there's no accountability or no engagement. We'll look into it. We'll get back to you at the next meeting. And then they don't. It's so frustrating, and it's a really disgusting use of taxpayer funds, and no one's being helped. Also, we offered in a meeting to help her find a different location in the district. And there's a lot of people that work with developers and real estate in our neighborhood that, no, there's no interest or no follow up on that point. We would like to help. We don't think it's the best site, location, there's an elementary school nearby and other concerns. The underlying fraud being the number one concern. And. And it doesn't matter. In addition to constantly expressing these rules that cannot be enforced, our councilwoman now is reaching out to other neighboring HOAs allegedly, and telling them that we're spreading misinformation, naming me by name. Samantha Nussbaum is spreading misinformation about me. Don't listen to what that group's telling you. I know I can run this a certain way, and some of them listen. And that's also frustrating because now we have to not only Deal with trying to expose what we believe to be fraud, but also how you deal with someone she's supposed to be representing us and rather is really doing the opposite.

[D]

Do you think that missing money could potentially that's money going into her campaign or is there a way to track. I mean, I guess the money's missing, but who knows? So I always wonder if the reason why they protected is because that money somehow comes back and helps their re election campaigns or somebody puts money in there, you know, a different project. I just feel like that's why other what would it be? Why would she be fighting for this?

[C]

Right.

[D]

What's her payoff?

[C]

Right. I mean, I guess it's called pay to play. Like the idea being that extra money is kept or used in these deals to then pay it forward into other campaigns. I don't have proof of any particular campaign. Right. That it went to or who or someone in her, you know, that she reports to perhaps that said, like this needs to get done. So get it done. And maybe that person's getting campaign support or something else. I mean, every single person, almost every single person that worked on this deal in la, Housing Department, the mayor's office, Katie's office no longer works there anymore. So when we started sending our concerned emails the second time around, most of them bounced back. Some of these people are organizations that Weingart donates. Weingart's Foundation. The Weingart foundation donates significantly to people that pushed the deal through and now they're working places.

[D]

Who does Winegard donate to?

[C]

Well, Weingart center who's running this is a, is a 501C3, but they have an affiliated. So the entity that created them, it's called the Weingart foundation and they do a lot of donating. So there's an entity called Abundant Housing that was one of them. Weingart foundation is listed as one of their platinum donors. And somebody who was one of the most prominent on the inner emails on this deal now works there. He's the one who said he shared the property and the $47 million to spend on it. So, you know, the tracing the money is the hard part for me. Not having the technology or the, you know, connections of the FBI that the FBI might have.

[D]

Have you met with the criminal investigation team at the irs because they can do their own investigation separate what I've learned with the fire aid scam. So the FBI is doing their thing and the criminal investigation, IRS can do their own whole thing. All they need is documents. So it would be Worth. I'll give you the contact after this, bringing all your paper to them. And then there's two investigations. And what I've learned is they can merge together eventually or they could do their own whole thing because they have, I think, a 93%. Yeah, they. They get everybody they go after.

[C]

That'll be great. I do. I have heard that they are involved in this current investigation, but it never hurts to always double check and resend things. Again, I made an org chart for them. Well, for the FBI and asked that it be also distributed to the irs. Of all these entities were created during this deal. So many entity names and then a nonprofit shows up under the middleman. At one point he's a private real estate developer. But there's this nonprofit that Weingart's done projects within the past as a partner, ends up under a common general partner of the business developer in the middle. And there's very odd affiliations. I started wondering if maybe it's almost like the entities are affiliated before the deal closes. I don't know what sort of tax advantage that creates or exactly what is going on. And I also had suspicions about how the grant money is being reported on the financial statements of the nonprofit. There was a disconnect between what the city approved as. There's a home key grant and then there's a city loan. There's all these different sources of the money. Right. The city's super confused about what goes to what. But one is definitely marked for acquisition, and then one is marked for renovation. And it's used in the opposite way it was originally marked to be used as. And I don't know if there's a reason for that. Again. So that was sort of like, here, can the IRS look at this? Just doesn't look right. And again, I do think that this is happening in these other projects because it's the same level of or lack of oversight and structure. Once the money is there, the max amount is just rolling down and down to these organizations and nobody checks on what they're doing with it.

[D]

It's just like I posted the other the other day, opm, other people's money. They don't care because it's not their money. And if anything, spending the money helps their political careers and their relationships. What's so wild is to think about in California, you spread it out. We know there's 24 billion, that Newsom will say it's accountable, go look on this audit. But if someone like you went to every single one of these, that 24 billion how much is ever going to an actual homeless person? You know, it's right.

[C]

Very little.

[D]

Think about of that, what, 60 million. 60 million of that's been spent now three years later, a homeless person hasn't changed one of their lives.

[C]

No, not at all. And the seniors had to find new homes. You know, I moved my grandfather at one point into an assisted living facility. That. That is difficult. It is really hard to find the right place that has availability that fits your budget, where you think the people working there will treat your family members the way you want them to. And people in there need assistance. So once they're in there, just physically moving them to a different location and hoping there's a spot available that meets all those other criteria is so difficult. I know one neighbor had a mother who passed away shortly after they were moved out and she hasn't really wanted to speak much about it. But that's just one person. You know, everyone has a story and nobody seems to care about those stories. And as you said, and nobody's being helped. So there was this emergency declaration that enabled and still enables to some extent, even though it's been declared over. But developers and these nonprofits to buy these properties and not conduct public review. Environmental review should open here. Those considerations. There's a senior home. You know what?

[B]

Well, this episode is brought to you by Peloton Break through the busiest time of year with the brand new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus. Powered by Peloton iq. With real time guidance and endless ways to move, you can personalize your workouts and train with confidence, helping you reach your goals in less time. Let yourself run, lift, sculpture, push and go Explore the new peloton cross training Tread [e-mail] Toogood Co Coffee creamers are

[H]

made with farm fresh cream, real milk and contain 3 grams of sugar per serving. That's 40% less than the 5 grams per serving in leading traditional coffee creamers for a rich, delicious experience. Whether you enjoy your coffee hot, cold, bold or frothy, two good coffee creamers make every sip a good one. Two good coffee creamers. Real goodness in every sip. Find them at your local Kroger in the creamer aisle.

[E]

Close your eyes, exhale, feel your body relax and let go of whatever you're carrying today. Well, I'm letting go of the worry that I wouldn't get my new contacts in time for this class. I got them delivered free from 1-800-contacts. Oh my gosh, they're so fast. And breathe. Sorry, I almost couldn't Breathe. When I saw the discount they gave me on my first order. Oh, sorry. Namaste.

[C]

Visit 1-800-contacts.com today to save on your first order.

[D]

1-800-contacts.

[C]

Everything that rational that would normally go on in this process and. But it seems like such a front because now we're three years later almost and it's a. It's a massive construction site still. The new roof they put on the building leaked in a recent rain and they tore out all the drywall from inside the building again. So like down with studs inside.

[D]

And bride asked for more money, you know.

[C]

Right.

[D]

Or went in. It's truly mind boggling that. What's wild is you would think that local press would have been. I guess it was all secretive. But the videos of these seniors getting kicked out of the housing would have. I feel like that sounds like something local news would have wanted to document.

[C]

But I guess dealer was not out in public yet at that time. That was for before even the first closing because Steven had to deliver it empty.

[D]

So he kicked them out before it was even perfectly shopped.

[C]

Right. The first deal closed December, very end of December 2023. The sale to Weingart closes within about a handful. Five or so business days later. It looks like 10 on paper but it's Christmas and New Year's and holidays and weekends. So there's a few business days and the next deal, the deed is signed but the city waits four months to record it. So between December and April still nobody knows about the deal. Then they're dealing with the city loan documents the whole time. Fund escrow, don't fund escrow. Can we fund Weingart directly again? The emails, four months of city emails that I have. No one knows how to actually get the deal done just in terms of where to wire the money when it finally. When the money finally transfers through in April, then they record it again. Even the deed was signed the first week of January. That's when the media picked it up because it became more in public record at that time in April. So the first story. So it's a four month flip. People thought, wow, someone sat around for four months and got so lucky. No, that's not what happened. Actually it was way worse than that.

[D]

Have you looked into how many of these type of developments this Steven guy has done?

[C]

No, I haven't. I know when the indictment came out it did reveal a significant number of alleged accounts of bank fraud and other deals. But I don't know if any of them were related to homeless shelter operators. I'd Be more interested in how many other deals has Weingart been in where they're just handed all this money and what was really the fair market value of the property? When was it really last sold? Who did the appraisal? What did it say? And I started looking at that recently within the same round of home key, thinking how you know and it's there. But I haven't done the public records requests in those deals. As you know, it was very time consuming.

[D]

How many do Weingart have Approximately? They have 10 of these going on at least.

[C]

Yeah, at least 10.

[D]

Maybe times 60 million or 10 times maybe 30.

[C]

30 million. Purchase price is really common. I noticed in some of them I pulled the acquisition prices and that's because they come up with the purchase price based on there's a schedule of cost per door. The max is 400,000 per door. So we got lucky on Shelby, we got 400,000 per door because it fit under this category of chronically homeless. If you house chronically homeless people, you get more money per door and there's like a sliding scale down. But that then is like this is the most we can give you for. So there's a lot of common purchase price values in these deals. If you were to look at them. There is. And then it's an example of incompetence plus wasteful spending. There's an email, someone in on the city side emails an executive at Weingart and says, how should we pay you the operating funds? What do you do in your other deals? Do you submit some sort of accounting of expenses or do we just send it to you all up front? I had to read that three times. The city is asking the person who's receiving the money, what do you do normally? Do you send some sort of expense evidence?

[D]

Do you have cash? Do you want to in gold coins? Do you want bitcoin?

[C]

It's really crazy that no one knows

[D]

how to twenties or fifties their job.

[C]

So he writes back, we propose you do it the same way you're paying us or the city is paying us on our first round home key project with you at some place called Beacon. It was previously a hotel. I started looking at this too. And for Shelby, this it's the $100 per door per day operation subsidy. So he's calling out that this formula has been used and is currently being used and please do it again for us. And you know, I wish I had the time. I have actually a full time job so I wish I had time to do this. And I mean there's so much to expose out there. Someone needs to really be looking at all the details.

[D]

Unbelievable. I mean, it's believable. That's why you see so many homeless people. Because they're spending $60 million, years go by and nobody got one of the $400,000 rooms.

[C]

Right, right. There's also, it's. I don't even like to get into it because I feel like it detracts from like the real big picture and important points to me on this case. But there's this underlying lawsuit that LA alliance sued the city for not providing the beds they're supposed to provide for homeless people. Defending the rights of the homeless people who deserve to be in housing. And there's a settlement agreement from that. And now a judge, Judge Carter. There's all these orders for how to enforce the settlement agreement. It's very complicated. But there's these quotas. They're milestones that each district has to hit and he's given them deadlines. This is a voluntary. It is a binding contract with voluntary agreement. And the districts have these, again, these quotas they wanted. And that is driving their. At least what they will say is driving their desire to pick these spots regardless of whether it makes sense financially or to the community or for any other reason, because they just want more beds to comply with this quota. So it's, you know, agenda and political driven, a lot of it also.

[D]

So it's just like what I keep seeing across the city with. Whether it's the fire department or lapd, they have all the proper things in place that they're supposed to be doing. They just don't do it right. So if you were to come in all of a sudden, you didn't have this full time job and they gave you a job at the city to stop all the homeless money fraud. What are the. What does that list look like from your perspective? How do you.

[C]

Right, Well, I think you need to. First of all, I wouldn't be giving money away to these other organizations. Then go buy the building. So now they're stuck in this situation here where the city doesn't own this building. So they can't. We say stop it. They say we don't own it. Right. So that's to me like that one thing. Like the city needs to control its own finances. So if things go wrong, if an operator misbehaves or steals funds or is just not doing their job well, there's recourse. And the city can replace the operator or sell the building or do something else. But they, they aren't doing that. And they also aren't employing people to oversee all of the use. You know, they're giving money away before checking what it's going towards. So I think there needs to just be a lot of more accountability at the outset, not just looking back. Now we keep on looking back to see why it was, what was approved and, you know, was it actually used. But in this case, we've identified a variety of what we believe to be breaches of the underlying contract. So there's a home key award, which funded a portion of the purchase. And then there's also, the city gives these matching amounts. They call it a loan, but it's like a no recourse loan. They basically give the money away, but there's a loan document. Both of those documents have provisions, termination for cause should Weingart breach the provisions. And we've identified provisions that we believe have been breached. The appraisal rules weren't followed. There's a lot of reasons. So we've said to the city, you should act on this. Terminate the contract. We'll look into it. You know, no, they won't act on their, on the. And. Or they say, we don't own it. Even though we said, we know you don't own it, but you can terminate the contract and then there's remedies to follow. So, you know, it could go into foreclosure. There's other steps that are outlined and. But no one, no one will look at them. But it is true that they don't own the building.

[D]

I mean, you would just think, any investment, you're going to spend $30 million, even if you're getting ripped off on the building, at least own the building. And then the city has all this property they own, right? And then they put, okay, say home key fails them and they're not doing a good job, remove them from that building. As the operator.

[C]

Right, Exactly. Katie Aroslovsky pretends she can do that. When we have our zoom, she says, I don't want to do business with Weingart. If there are criminals and if the FBI finds fraud, I'll replace the operator.

[D]

Can't do that.

[C]

Can't do that. And if I'm on mute on a zoom, like waving, you can't do that. But that's the line. We'll replace the operator. I, I'll shut it down. She has said many times, I'll shut it down. She has no authority to shut it down.

[D]

Lie. Lies.

[C]

You know, we go to them because we want them Just to voice their opposition, to support our perspective. Not because we think city council can shut it down. And you know, it's. It gets lost in translation somehow that. And they get stuck on certain words that they like to repeat.

[D]

Misinformation.

[C]

Misinformation is one of them.

[D]

That's her favorite word. I can do that's a conspiracy. In. In conclusion.

[C]

In conclusion, every day the money is just being drained away from taxpayers pockets because construction is ongoing. And again we've said to the representatives in our letters and everything else, why don't you try to stop it? You're the waste is ongoing and if fraud is found, you've continued to let it exist. And if the feds don't find fraud as fraud is defined, there are other elements here that are unacceptable based on a variety of other things that have happened. You certainly overpaid. You know, the building's nowhere near being done. You have a lien, you know, maybe make the right choice and. And they won't. And again we've revealed these things and they're. It gets ignored. So our Integrity Project has an Instagram account where we are trying to expose and really spread the story. Because again, you see, it's so specific. Sometimes I'll post one email and she's like, look at that. You know, this mismanagement needs to be seen by other people. So we're trying to spread information that way. It's the Integrity Project with underscores between each word. And we have fundraising, are doing another round of fundraising for a small group who is pursuing legal action currently in progress. Nothing's public as of today, but will be in some point soon. And that group. So the nonprofit is donating the funds raised to the legal retainer to continue to keep that challenge alive because no one will fight it for us unless we do.

[D]

Hopefully with your account and your story, the other people that obviously had Weingart do this in their communities are gonna come to you and be like, oh my God, this happened for four years. And eventually you can just unpeel the whole onion of one of these major clearly scammers on our. Here's the other thing. People will argue. I can see the other side. Oh, she's upset that they're trying to put homeless people in her community. But no, you should be upset because that's your tax money that they're stealing. And not only that, they're not putting homeless people in a space for years where they could have used that money way more efficiently in 2024 and house homeless people and Also, they don't even have to, according to their, their bylaws, whatever. They don't even have to put homeless people in this building when it's all done. So for 60 million in tax dollars they could have five people in there and still get all the money monthly.

[C]

Right? To people who judge us or make comments like that, I mean that's what I say. And some people will listen and some people won't. But we're again, we offer to help, help find other sites trying to point out people are not being housed and we're concerned about alleged fraud. I mean I can say based on our investigation so far, things that we haven't even, you know, released on the Instagram or otherwise yet are really concerning, you know, ranging from gross negligence to extreme corruption or worse. It doesn't look good. And people should care about that in the community. Like you said there, it's taxpayer money. And if you're on the other side of that, I just don't understand what you're supporting.

[D]

Boom. Well make I will continue sharing because I am definitely on your side. You know, I'll even hear, you know, I, we had a yimby on this week or last week. I'll hear people that want to put, I'll even hear their argument to put high density duplexes in a community like let's get tax paying, you know, citizens that can't afford like I understand that but I won't be on the side of the, let's put 78 homeless housing next to where kids and schools are. Because I've grown up in la. I see the mental health, the drug addiction problem that they can't control anywhere in LA. So they're gonna say oh no, this 78, this 78 mental health drug problem housed individuals, they're gonna be safe in this building next to these kids and their school. Katie, you're a sclassie promises you, she promises I will never, you know, I'll listen to like a yimby say they want just people part of the community wanting. I still not saying I totally agree with a lot of the things they're saying, but that makes sense. You know, let's, let's fit more of the hard working community that's paying taxes that wants to be at that school and at that point, right. How are we going to make sure that the people that are paying for that community who are paying all the taxes, they should feel safe, they shouldn't have to fear what ifs because it's clearly this part of society, the homeless you have created a problem. The city where it's unmanageable.

[C]

Right.

[D]

Anywhere. So you're gonna now manage it next to the kids at the park.

[C]

No, it creates a management requirement on the community that not a job that you signed up for is. There's a home right next door to this, right across the street, right on the other side. You know, the whole neighborhood now has to become, you know, guards for this, essentially, if you. To keep your family safe. And we said in response to Katie, the no drugs and alcohol. There's this program, housing first, where they come inside first. They don't have to be sober. In fact, they have a drug of choice in house to help with their drug addiction. And they can refuse treatment, and it can just have to be offered to them, the treatment. But refusing treatment is not grounds for being removed. Committing a crime is not grounds for being removed. No criminal background checks. You need a house first. And then recovery if someone wants recovery. So that's the funding requirement.

[D]

That is in the building there.

[C]

That is in the building. All right. Katie pretends they'll have rules. I don't, but we say, oh, pretend you can't have those rules because the funding mandates housing first inside Safe harm reduction, all these. And there's a California law that codified some of this, and the law is referenced in the loan document. So you can't do it, but just pretend for a second that you can. How are you going to actually enforce. No drugs or alcohol? Like, tell us. Tell us.

[D]

Explain.

[C]

They'll. They. Whoever they are. I don't know. People who work there, they will smell alcohol. Oh, when they smell alcohol, those people will be asked to leave. Now, I have that on video from our zoom. Okay, Katie, so, you know, it's reckless in our opinion, with the current infrastructure that exists, that they're just the safeguards necessary to run a facility like that in a residential neighborhood don't exist yet, in my opinion. So it ends up being dangerous for the community.

[D]

It doesn't exist without the housing. They can't even protect streets from. What's happening with the homeless people, not with the bed.

[C]

Right.

[D]

So you're gonna house them. You can't do it on the streets, so you're gonna now control it in the $400,000 bed. All right, well, Katie, you're on my list, too. Well, we're gonna expose Katie Yarosclosky. Is Westwood in her district?

[C]

Yes.

[D]

Oh. Oh, she's done a great job. She's destroyed my favorite place to go to the movies with an entire Encampment.

[C]

Yeah. And the whole Westwood.

[D]

She's really good at managing the encampment. Yeah. Yeah. Great job, Katie. Well, thank you so much.

[C]

Thank you for having me.

[D]

People like you inspire me to step it up and just obviously talk way more legal. You're so good at never everything's allegedly and in my opinion. And I'm gonna take that.

[C]

I'm running a non profit and I'm a lawyer, so that's incredible work.

[D]

No, you are. I am. Goals for my future public speaking. But you and your husband keep at it. Anything I can do, I am all in because that's what people keep saying to me. Well, what are you gonna do? Like, it's like it's this magic solution. It sounds like just talking to you for an hour. There's a lot of steps I could do pretty quick if somebody gave me the. The mechanisms to put them in place.

[C]

Absolutely.

[D]

So it's not, it's not rocket science.

[C]

No.

[D]

Lindsay Horvath was like, he doesn't know how to run a city. Like clearly she doesn't period. But I know what you guys are doing, obviously is scamming us taxpayers. So thankfully I have experts that can guide me into stopping what they're doing.

[C]

I wanted to thank you extra special thank you for having me on because for a year and a half, maybe more, I've been reaching out, it feels like on a daily basis to so many media outlets, magazines, newspapers, tv, everything, begging for an opportunity to come share this story. Beyond there was an arrest or beyond Kevin Murray's investigation, there's no one has let me or accepted the chance to hear all about this corruption until you. So I wanted to thank you. But it's really a shame because I have sent my Dropbox full of 7,000 pages of materials and my memos to every major newspaper you can imagine. And no one will report on it to the, you know, local media. West side. Kern's done a really great job and the laist. So I appreciate them very much. That's our local Fox Matt, who came by and did a live clip outside the shelter.

[D]

Matt's our next guest.

[C]

Oh, really?

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

Today I love Matt.

[D]

He's a real journalist.

[C]

He is great.

[D]

He's great. You know why I think that is? And this is my. I'm convinced is local media. Their bread and butter is getting the first interview at the Olympics with the mayor or this blah, blah, blah. That's their talent. So if they start burning like it's like a reality show, let's say. And those are the stars of local news. And if they expose them and burn them, they don't get that source quote and go over here for this. So I'm convinced they're in on the fix. So that's my why they don't want to take down the homeless industrial complex. Because first off, then they're worried about blowback. Oh, you're being mean to. That's the thing. You say anything about homeless, like, oh, you don't care about homeless. No, we do care about homeless. It's our money you're scamming with your fraud.

[C]

They don't want to put certain representatives in bad light. But again, facts are facts, and that's what the media is for. But so thank you.

[D]

Boom. We are the media now here at the Fame Game.