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Santa Monica business owner offering one-way flights to get homeless out of California
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A Santa Monica business owner has launched a grassroots initiative to address California’s growing homelessness crisis, stepping in where he says city and Los Angeles County leaders have failed to act.
Roughly three weeks ago, Santa Monica property owner John Alle and fellow business owners in the southern California city hatched a plan to help reduce homelessness on their streets, through a targeted and voluntary family reunification program. Their goal is to assist individuals who have been homeless for less than a year and are actively seeking help, by reuniting them with loved ones in their hometowns — where they’re more likely to get the support they need to succeed.
Through the nonprofit Alle co-founded, the Santa Monica Coalition, a small group of local donors personally fund travel expenses for these trips. They’ve also implemented an AI-powered hotline to efficiently handle the flood of incoming requests.
Since the program’s launch in June, the hotline has received over 500 calls, and they’ve completed the reunification process for eight people so far, according to Alle.
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Homeless encampments line the boardwalk on Venice Beach in Los Angeles. (Reuters)
“I think it’s a scalable solution that’ll work over and over because there’s motivation,” Alle told Fox News Digital. “And this is valuable as an asset when cities and counties are desperate for fixes right now and spending way too much with no results and missing funds.”
Alle shared videos of two people boarding trains and planes to their homes in Pennsylvania and Wyoming this week through the program. They talked about feeling unsafe living in California and wanting to reunite with their families.
Alle hopes to eventually transition the project to a nonprofit organization that is equally committed to the reunification model. He believes the simple strategy is going to have a bigger impact than “housing and other expensive, frankly, go-nowhere methods that are being tried and have been tried over the last three or four years” by the local government.
“The homelessness and the crime is increasing at the same rate as the increase in funding. And that’s not a good sign. It shows it’s not working,” he said.
Alle said the program isn’t intended to help everyone, but it is one step in the right direction.
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People and the homeless spend time in an area known for illegal drug use at the corner of Alvarado Street and Wilshire Blvd. in MacArthur Park, in the Westlake District on December 12, 2024. (Getty Images)
“There’s different levels of homelessness,” Alle said. “There’s mentally ill people who need drastic help, institutional help, that we’re not equipped to help. And there are drug addicts, alcohol addicted, that need help with special programs. Our program is focused on those that have been here for less than a year, and they’re motivated. They’re contacting us.”
Participation in the program is open to anyone who meets a few key criteria. Candidates must have identification to travel through the airport, and a family member or friend must commit to receiving them upon arrival. Alle’s team personally verifies these arrangements with family beforehand to confirm their willingness and capability. Each participant must also sign a waiver agreeing that they are going along with the program of their own accord.
Alle says the county and city’s solutions aren’t helping the situation and have made the tourist destination a hotbed for violent crime and homelessness.
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Santa Monica, California business owner says businesses are hurting and residents feel unsafe in the area due to rampant crime and homelessness. (iStock)
“Our city has been taken over by the mentally ill and addicted who desperately need help,” the Santa Monica Coalition says in a flyer on their website telling people to stay away from the city. “Sadly, many of them refuse shelter and services. The City Manager and City Leaders hide behind policy adoptions and limitations as their reasoning for not taking action towards resolving the human catastrophe at hand. Meanwhile, their lack of political will makes for everyone’s loss.”
Santa Monica residents and business owners who make up the nonprofit are calling on city leaders to take action on the city’s rising crime and homelessness.
“We’re really trying to push our city leaders, who have been ignoring the depravity on the streets, the crime, the theft, the homelessness that’s not being addressed,” Alle told Fox News Digital.
The coalition filed a lawsuit against the LA County Public Health Department, its director, Barbara Ferrer and the Venice Family Clinic, last year over the county’s needle distribution program to the homeless. Clean needles are handed out as part of the county’s “harm reduction” effort, which also includes the overdose-reversal drug Naloxone.
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A sign on a wall next to Langer’s Deli urges LA Mayor Karen Bass to resign in the MacArthur Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, California on May 1, 2025. John Alle says local businesses have urged Bass to keep city streetlights on at night to deter crime. (Getty Images)
The LA County Health Department released a statement in 2024 defending the harm-reduction efforts, saying they are “well demonstrated to reduce overdose deaths, reduce the public use of injectable drugs, reduce transmission of communicable diseases (e.g., HIV/AIDS and viral hepatitis), increase access to substance use services, reduce the use of emergency medical services, and increase public safety.”
Gangs are also a huge problem for business owners and residents’ safety, Alle says. He shared photos of his properties vandalized by MS-13 and other cartels as recently as last week. But he says city officials have turned a blind eye to the problems plaguing Santa Monica.
“It’s gotten out of control,” Alle described the situation. “We’ve got cartels — MS-13 and the 18th street gang, very active in that area. We have crews every day painting up their tagging because if we don’t paint it over the next day, it becomes a competition and a source of friction among the other cartels over who controls the area.”
Gang graffiti on one of John Alle’s properties in LA. (The Santa Monica Coalition)
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health told Fox News Digital that a proposed judgment had been entered in favor of LA County and Ferrer last month in LA County Superior Court regarding the needle distribution lawsuit filed by Alle and the Santa Monica Coalition against county officials.
The Santa Monica City Council told Fox News Digital it already has a reunification program that it started in 2006.
“The city of Santa Monica has a longstanding reunification program administered by our Homelessness Prevention & Intervention (HPI) Division called Project Homecoming. Project Homecoming was launched in 2006 and has reunited over 3200 individuals who are experiencing homelessness within the city of Santa Monica with family and friends living elsewhere. Individuals are identified by our trusted and professional partners who perform outreach within the city of Santa Monica on a daily basis,” a spokesperson for the city said.
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“Frisco, welcome to the city of the fog…”
That’s how San Francisco rapper Frak starts out his first bars in a new song – a love letter to the city that shaped him.
From Bay Area poetry slams to national television, Frak has built a career around quick wit, improvisation, and sharp punchlines. The San Francisco native first gained recognition in the battle rap scene before appearing on MTV, BET, and VH1’s Wild ‘N Out.
But during Jewish Heritage Month, the artist says his work is also deeply connected to identity and culture.
“I think Jewish heritage had a big impact on my music,” Frak said. “The self-deprecation, the cynicism, the humor all that stuff in my culture has been worked into my craft.”
Frak says his perspective was shaped by his family’s immigrant roots. His parents came to the United States from Peru and Hungary, experiences he says influenced both his worldview and his creative voice.
“Jewish culture isn’t a monolith,” he said. “It’s brought so much joy and humor to my life.”
Now, Frak is expanding beyond traditional rap performances with immersive live productions that combine hip-hop, theater, gaming, and comedy.
“We built a huge game cartridge, and this whole stage became a video game world,” he explained.
His latest project, Four Square, transforms concertgoers into active participants, blending music, storytelling, and audience interaction into what he describes as a larger creative mission.
“I’ve been blessed to have a platform now to make amazing music, do rap battles, be on Wild ‘N Out, even do comedy and political satire,” Frak said. “My goal is to bring it all together and also bring the community together.”
Longtime collaborator Kaly Jay says that vision has always been central to Frak’s work.
“We’ve been doing this since we were 14 years old,” Kaly Jay said. “To still be doing this, it’s a blessing.”
He added that Frak’s ability to connect different creative communities across the Bay Area is part of what makes the work resonate.
“In a city many people say has lost its artistic identity. There are still so many artists making things happen,” Frak said. “We still have the culture.”
Frak’s next immersive Four Square performance is scheduled for August 14 at The Independent in San Francisco.
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PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) — Police from Vancouver, British Columbia, traveled to Portland to announce a break in a cold case from four years ago, linking a missing person to the Portland-Seattle area.
“This is a woman who died alone, a long way from home. And we feel an obligation, and it’s important to be able to reunite her with her family,” said Sgt. Adam Donaldson with the Vancouver Police Missing Persons Unit in Canada.
On September 29, 2022, a tugboat crew found a woman’s body floating in the waters off Spanish Banks in British Columbia.
She was found near a blue inflatable kayak and had candy, insulin, and a backpack, but no identification.
While they were able to get a pulse back on her, she never regained consciousness and was officially declared dead the following morning.
Police from Vancouver, British Columbia, traveled to Portland to announce a break in a cold case from four years ago, linking a missing woman to the Portland-Seattle area. By sharing her story on YouTube and spreading flyers with this illustrated rendering of the unidentified woman across the Pacific Northwest, they hope to get tips that lead to answers/Avery Elowitt, KATU News
“We know what somebody’s got to know about her. She’s somebody’s sister. She’s somebody’s daughter. She’s somebody’s friend. Somebody’s coworker. Somebody will know who she is,” said Detective Rebecca Matson with the Vancouver Police Missing Persons Unit.
After four years with no leads, Sgt. Anton Schamberger with the Vancouver Police Missing Persons Unit in Canada came across a forensic technique that hadn’t been used by their agency, and has increased movement in this four-year-old investigation.
“They were able to say, based on pollen grains and fern spores found on her sweater, that the sweater had had recent exposure to an urban or suburban environment in the Pacific Northwest, most positively between Portland and Seattle,” said Sgt. Schamberger. “They were also able to say, based on the complete lack of pollen grains and fern spores that were native to British Columbia, that she likely had not had any exposure or was likely not a resident.”
Now, the Vancouver Police Department, Portland Police Bureau, and the Seattle Police Department are reaching beyond the Canadian border.
KATU’s Avery Elowitt asked, “With this new information, how will future outreach efforts be different from these previous efforts now that we have more local ties?”
Sgt. Donaldson answered, “Well, if we have more local ties, we can focus the information, and since we’ve done some outreach in the past few days, we have had some actionable tips to our email address. So now we’re going to have to go back, start investigating those tips, and build up that investigation. It may not be information that leads directly to her identification, but it can narrow the scope of the investigation.”
By sharing her story on YouTube and spreading flyers with this illustrated rendering of the unidentified woman across the Pacific Northwest, they hope to get tips that lead to answers.
Police from Vancouver, British Columbia, traveled to Portland to announce a break in a cold case from four years ago, linking a missing woman to the Portland-Seattle area. By sharing her story on YouTube and spreading flyers with this illustrated rendering of the unidentified woman across the Pacific Northwest, they hope to get tips that lead to answers/Avery Elowitt, KATU News
“What we need is one tip. All it takes is one. All it takes is someone saying, ‘hey, that’s my auntie,’ ‘that’s my mom.’ Or, ‘that was my neighbor,’” said Sgt. Donaldson.
The unidentified woman is believed to be approximately 30-40 years old, Black, and despite extensive investigation across North America, no missing persons report matches her descriptions, according to the Vancouver Police Department.
If you have any information on this case, email thekayaker@vpd.ca or call 604-717-0619.
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