But Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa of Los Angeles stood before the news media this week and declared unequivocally, "This is the capital of homelessness in America."
The mayor was reacting to the bald truth of a report released Thursday, based on what officials called the most comprehensive census and survey of homelessness in Los Angeles County, that found 88,345 homeless people in the city and surrounding communities.
No other county in the country comes close - the five boroughs of New York have 48,155 homeless people, according to figures from its own census last year reported to the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development.
But even if he wanted to, Mr. Villaraigosa, six months into his first term, would find it difficult these days to skirt the homeless problem here.
For one thing, he had made a campaign promise to increase the supply of affordable housing and recently pledged $50 million for a trust fund that has helped finance more than 3,500 units for the poor since 2002. Only about 12 percent of the households in the county can afford the median home price, about $500,000.
The Los Angeles County government has allocated $25 million for increased emergency shelters, which advocates for the homeless say are badly needed; there are 18,000 homeless shelter beds, which critics call paltry considering the much higher number of homeless people.
In March, a group of city and county leaders, Bring Los Angeles Home, plans to issue an overdue report on confronting the problem, a spokesman for the group said this week. The group's stated goal is to end homelessness within 10 years.
In addition, much soul-searching came after the Los Angeles police last fall publicly accused several suburban law enforcement agencies of adding to the woes of the downtown neighborhood Skid Row by dropping off homeless troublemakers there. Around the same time, a front-page series by Steve Lopez, a Los Angeles Times columnist, documenting wanton drug dealing and lewd behavior in Skid Row despite years of promises to clean it up, further galvanized public discussion.
Homeless advocates said they were cautiously optimistic that the tide of events might lead to a decrease in homelessness, having experienced previous spasms of interest that eventually faded. They are waiting to see the extent to which the root causes of homelessness here - high poverty rates and a dearth of affordable housing and mental and drug treatment services - are tackled.
"I want this to be a watershed moment," said Lisa Fisher, director of the Westside Shelter and Hunger Coalition, a consortium of groups aiding the homeless. "How many homeless people are enough to move county, city and community members to action?"
Another advocate, Joel John Roberts, the chief executive of the nonprofit People Assisting the Homeless, said he was not sure whether to take all of the results as gospel. A spokesman for the Department of Housing and Urban Development said all the homeless census reports they received would be reviewed to evaluate their reliability.
But Mr. Roberts said, "This is the first time in many years that the city of L.A. and county of L.A. are stepping up to the plate and saying we are deal with this problem."
The new head count in Los Angeles hewed close to previous estimates, but advocates for the homeless and government officials said it was important to quantify the population in order to raise awareness and seek government financing. Indeed, the survey was spurred mainly by HUD, which had asked cities and counties to do the count and uses such data as a factor in weighing grants.
The report held few surprises for people who follow the issue closely, but it did reaffirm some suspicions.
Most of the homeless surveyed in greater Los Angeles, 78 percent, said they were living here before they lost shelter, contrary to popular belief that the warm climate drew the homeless from other places.