Mayor Karen Bass heading to Washington to advocate for homeless veterans

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- A new state audit finds that there are an estimated 171,000 homeless people in California. Many of them are veterans.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is heading to Washington D.C. soon to advocate for homeless veterans.

Bass is joining a bipartisan group of more than 40 mayors from across the country to shine light on the issue and urge lawmakers to do more to prevent veterans from becoming homeless.

"Personally I am the daughter of a veteran," Bass said. "My father fought in World War II. And so in his memory, to me, this is part of my responsibility. And there are a lot of different categories of people who are unhoused and this is one category."

Formerly homeless veterans who are working with the mayor have messages of hope for others facing the same challenges.

"You are not alone," said veteran Juan Garcia. "It is hard. It's probably one of the hardest battles that you'll ever go through."

"Combat is one thing. Sometimes it's a walk in the park compared to coming back and just losing everything that you've ever had."