Los Angeles’s Skid Row is home to an increasingly older population of women, many of whom have experienced domestic and sexual abuse, according to a new report.
The “Downtown Women’s Needs Assessment” found more than half the homeless women living on Skid Row are over 51 years old. About 23 percent were sexually abused in the last year, the report found. Nearly 57 percent have been the victims of domestic violence.
“There are women in this aging population who have been homeless for a long time, between five and 10 years,” Molly Moen, chief operating officer of the Downtown Women’s Action Coalition said. “But we also see a significant number of women in this aging population who are in their first year of homelessness, and our sense from them is that they have recently become homeless because of the death of a spouse or the loss of a job or that sort of thing.”