Are Homeless Counts Even Worth The Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars of Cost?

Every two years, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) requires that every jurisdiction that receives HUD funding has to perform a count of how many homeless people are in the jurisdiction.

In 2005, Los Angeles County counted 88,000 homeless people. It was clearly an estimate. And it cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to perform. Even homeless people were paid to count their peers.

Earlier this year, another count was performed in Los Angeles—in compliance with HUD mandates. The actual number has not been released yet.

Most cities around the nation have released their numbers. And those cities that have created “Ten Year Plans to End Homelessness” (another HUD mandate) usually report that the number of homeless in the past two years has gone down.

But how can this happen when the science of counting people who are homeless is weak?

A good example is the City of Chicago. They are reporting that in their recent homeless count there were only 24 homeless people living in their downtown. Homeless advocates in that windy city say the real number is 21,000! Yes, 21,000.

How can the estimated number be off by 20,976?

To me, this homeless counting is a political football game. And where their football lands is not based on science, but based on politics.

So… in Los Angeles—the Homeless Capital of the Country—the homeless numbers will be released soon. It will be released in a city that does NOT have a “Ten Year Plan”. Will the number go up? Will it be the same? Or will it go down?

I think the only people who can answer that question right now are the political people who release the number. Because this is a political game not a scientific one.

Hopefully, we won’t have a ludicrous number like Chicago…

(Pic from www.advance.org)