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The cold weather didn’t stop dozens of people standing outside the Red Morton Community Center in Redwood City early Thursday morning. Shivering and sipping their coffee, they waited to receive their day’s assignment.
These were only a fraction of the more than 300 volunteers who gathered in San Mateo County in near freezing temperatures to participate in the 2022 One Day Homeless Count.
“We’re just so appreciative of staff and volunteers who get up early, brave the cold weather because this is so important to the County,” said County Manager Mike Callagy.
The event, organized by the HSA in collaboration with local nonprofits, is held biannually to provide a “point-in-time snapshot” of the number and location of people currently experiencing homelessness, according to the County. In addition to helping inform resource allocation within the local community, the count also satisfies requirements from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to generate a snapshot of homelessness nationwide.
Volunteers, who convened at 5 a.m. in ten local deployment sites countywide, were paired up and given a map of their assigned region. Each pair was asked to survey the streets in their area, noting the location and approximate number of people living in tents, encampments or vehicles.
“It's a lot like a wedding,” said Director of the County’s Human Services Agency (HSA), Ken Cole, laughing. “You have to have everything arranged, you have to have coffee ready, you have to have your sites to welcome the volunteers.”
Thursday’s cohort included workers from local housing nonprofits, such as All Home and Abode Services, as well as formerly individuals and local officials. County Sheriff Carlos Bolanos, former Mayor Diane Howard and Vice Mayor Diana Reddy were among those in attendance.
“You try to hit every street in that geographic area. You drive up and down,” said Callagy, who volunteered in Redwood City. “We're not going up and knocking on tents or knocking on doors of campers. But we do estimate how many people are living in that encampment.
“Even though it's not exactly an accurate count, it gives us an idea,” he said. “And more importantly, it gives us an idea where the encampments are, so we can send our homeless outreach team out there to try to provide services for these folks.”
Preparation for Thursday’s count began six months ago, according to Cole, and included recruiting and training volunteers, setting up the phone application “Counting Us” to record census data and coordinating with consultants to analyze the results.
All volunteers participated in a 1.5 hour Zoom training session in January, during which they learned how to identify encampments or other shelters, estimate the number of residents and use the tracking app.
“It has questions that it asks,” said volunteer Sharron Miller. “Is it a person on the street? Is a person in a tent? In an RV? In a structure that they built? Then you just enter that data, and then you go on to the next one.”
During the previous one day count, which took place in January 2019, volunteers documented 1,512 people countywide experiencing homelessness, a 21% increase since 2017, according to the final report. Nearly 15% of the unhoused people were reported to be living in Redwood City.
Before 2019, said Cole, who previously served as Director of the San Mateo County Department of Housing, “we were trending down in homelessness, which we're very pleased to see. Then we got a bump up in 2019.” This sudden increase was largely among people living in RVs or campers, which grew 127% in two years, he explained.
All 165 census tracts in the county were successfully surveyed by 10 a.m. on Thursday, according to Cole. The final report, which will include a breakdown of the geographic and demographic analysis results, isn’t expected until June or July. But because the COVID-19 pandemic delayed the planned 2021 count, Cole said the County might release some rough numbers ahead of time.
“The last full count we had was 2019,” said Cole. “So we're very desperate to get this data and be able to compare.”
Cole said he’s interested to see what kinds of trends the 2022 data indicate. While he predicts the pandemic will have had an impact, he’s not yet sure what that will be.
“With the economic impact of COVID, you would expect to have an increase in the homeless numbers…And the question will be how much how dramatically they may have gone up,” he said. But, he added, increased countywide efforts to transition people into temporary and permanent housing could have an impact.
“We've been better during COVID, to pay attention to the people on the street and really try to get them off. So we could see a drop or a flatline,” he said. “Our guesses are all over the place. And we won't know until we really get the data.”
For the County, the one day count represents just a small piece of a large, ongoing effort to address homelessness and achieve “functional zero,” meaning anyone who wants housing will be able to access it.
In February, the County received nearly $16 million in Homekey funds from the state for the purchase, rehabilitation and operation of the 51-room Comfort Inn. The residence will provide permanent housing for formerly homeless people, prioritizing those currently unhoused in Redwood City. A previous Homekey grant of $68 million was awarded in December to create more housing with the construction of a new 240-unit Navigation Center in Redwood City and renovation of another 44-room shelter in San Mateo.
“This is going to be a year of ending homelessness for us,” said Callagy, adding that the County has already purchased five hotels since 2020.
Callagy, who expressed gratitude for the “staff and volunteers who get up early, brave the cold weather,” wants to increase the frequency of homeless counts. To that end, he said, the County intends to roll out a phone app that will allow police, fire and public works officials to record real-time information.
“I want dashboards that show us how many people we’re moving off the street and how many people we’re moving from temporary housing situations to permanent housing. That's the kind of information I think will really be beneficial to us as a County,” Callagy said.
“The Board of Supervisors has made this a top priority for them. And therefore, it's a top priority for me.”
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