Assisted Living Waiver homes and recorded empty beds, by county

As of August 9, 2026, 934 licensed California homes participate in the Assisted Living Waiver (ALW), the Medi-Cal program that pays for assisted-living care. This page adds the context no state source publishes together: for each county, how many of those homes had at least one empty bed recorded at their most recent state licensing inspection. These are historical public-record figures — a recorded empty bed at a past inspection is not a bed available today; availability is only ever confirmed directly with a home.

DHCS ALW enrollment records · CDSS licensing roster · CDSS inspection reports · August 9, 2026

County table

CountyALW homes on fileWith an inspection censusHad ≥1 empty bed at that visitEmpty beds recorded
Los Angeles County3142351784,914
Orange County159101651,536
Riverside County1057055902
San Diego County735235489
Fresno County653217575
Sacramento County645037495
San Bernardino County573326597
Contra Costa County24———
Kern County231713106
Alameda County21———
San Joaquin County933134
Sonoma County755100
San Mateo County55416
Santa Clara County43246
San Francisco County3117
Solano County1———
Statewide9346074419,917

Inspection census dates in this table range from 2021-08-12 to 2026-06-12 — each home's figure is from its own most recent recorded state visit.

Methodology — exactly what these numbers are

ALW homes on file counts currently licensed residential care homes (including homes on a probationary license, which the directory lists with that status) whose record matches the DHCS Assisted Living Waiver participating-facilities list as of August 9, 2026. Absence from the list is not a negative fact about any home.

Inspection census figures come from the capacity and resident-census lines CDSS analysts record on inspection reports. For each home we use only its most recent report that records both numbers. “Empty beds recorded” is a positive-only sum: it adds capacity minus census across homes where capacity exceeded census at that visit, and adds nothing for homes at or over census. Homes whose reports do not record a census are counted in “ALW homes” but excluded from the inspection columns — never estimated.

The San Diego count differs from the state's own tool, by definition. The DHCS participating-facilities page rendered 42 San Diego rows when our research team fetched it on August 2, 2026. This page counts 73 San Diego homes. The two numbers answer different questions: the state's table lists the facility rows on its page, while our count takes the full dataset behind that page (95 distinct San Diego facility rows in the snapshot we ingested), matches each row to the CDSS licensing roster, de-duplicates, and counts only homes that are currently licensed. Rows that do not match a licensed residential-care-for-the-elderly record are excluded from our count.

Nothing on this page is ranked, scored, or paid-for; no home pays to appear in these counts. To confirm a bed at a specific home, use the home's page in the directory or ask us to confirm availability — free, either way.