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A sign posted near Skid Row warns against sleeping in public places. In recent weeks, the city of

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Lisa Thompkins has lived for the past four years on Skid Row, which is known for its sizable home

Lisa Thompkins has found herself on and off Skid Row for the past four years.

It began when her husband of 11 years started hitting her and she left him.

Unable to work due to back injuries acquired during her service in the U.S. Air Force, which were exacerbated by a fall years later, Thompkins began drinking to cope with her situation.

She now spends her days sitting on a crate near Wall Street, her nights in friends’ subsidized hotel rooms or shelters – if there are beds available.

In recent weeks, Thompkins has noticed a change on Skid Row, as an increase of police officers in the area has led to hundreds of drug-related arrests.

The arrests have been applauded by some as an effort to clean up the area and reduce drug use in the neighborhood, but others have criticized the arrests for sometimes being unwarranted. Critics have also said increasing arrests is not a solution to the homeless and drug problem.

Thompkins said these arrests have been a disruption of normal life in the area.

“The police are trying to get rid of drugs; in the meantime, they’re just (disturbing) everybody else,” she said of people like her, who partake in no drugs except alcohol.

In the past five weeks, the Los Angeles Police Department has taken measures to decrease drug use and sales in the downtown Los Angeles area, whose streets, sidewalks and parks are home to almost 2,000 people.

Fifty new officers were assigned to the area, and since the end of August, 737 felony narcotics arrests have been made, said Andrew Smith, commanding officer of the division that patrols Skid Row.

Of these, most were for “sales and possession for sales of heroin and rock cocaine in the downtown area,” he said.

“We’ve been arresting narcotics dealers by the boatload,” Smith added.

Smith said the sheer number of narcotics arrests that have been made in the area has improved safety and decreased illegal drug use.

“There are a lot less drugs being openly smoked, displayed and injected,” he said.

Tina Lee, a graduate student in the Department of Social Welfare at the UCLA School of Public Affairs, interns at the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul homeless shelter on Skid Row and works with people who are on their way to living independently.

She said her clients have mentioned that some people with no drug affiliation have been arrested on drug charges.

“Individual accounts from clients say not everyone arrested is using or holding drugs,” Lee said.

She added that her clients have told her they believe the arrests are being used as a way to get harmless people off the streets and into jail.

Lee said a narcotics arrest greatly hinders a homeless person’s ability to find a job and stabilize their lives because many employers won’t hire people with a narcotics arrest on their criminal record.

“It’s very difficult to get rehabilitated because it’s much harder for them to find employment,” she said.

Lee said concern for the city’s appearance may be a reason for the increase of arrests in the area.

“Basically, the city doesn’t want to see people on the streets because it looks bad,” Lee added.

While the drug users and dealers may be temporarily removed from Skid Row, Smith said the area jails are unable to accommodate those taken into custody.

Persons convicted of sales of rock cocaine and heroin are sentenced to 180 days in jail, but typically only serve about 10 percent of their time because of overcrowding, he said.

“The reality of it is these guys are not spending much time in jail at all, and that’s no incentive not to sell,” he said.

A collaborative effort between the LAPD and shelters has grown out of a desire to provide aid for people living on the streets – many of whom suffer from mental illness, addiction or both.

But according to shelter employees, there are more people in need of shelter than there are resources available to help them.

“Our shelter is always full,” said Justin Mammen, a social worker at Society of Saint Vincent de Paul and alumnus of the UCLA Master of Social Welfare program.

Thompkins said she often has trouble finding a place to sleep in the area.

“There’s not a lot of housing for women right now,” she said. “There just aren’t enough beds.”

Thompkins participated in a program through American Veterans for help with her alcohol program but has since returned to Skid Row and to her addiction. She said she feels stuck in her current situation, as she waits for monetary aid from Disabled American Veterans.

She said her two college-age children, whom she sent to live with relatives in Georgia when she started to drink too much, do not know where their mother is living.

“I don’t want to have to tell them I’ve been living on the street,” she said with tears in her eyes. “I don’t want them to be ashamed of me like I’m ashamed of me.”

Many parties connected to the homelessness situation in Los Angeles agree that an increase in support services and affordable housing is necessary to decrease the homeless population.

Though there is a concentration of services available to homeless people in the Skid Row area, Mammen mentioned the difficulty for people to get out of their situation in the drug-infested environment.

“Trying to kick a drug addiction here is like trying to go on the Atkins diet while living in a bakery,” he said.