Report: Homelessness Ticks Up in Orange County in 2018

Orange County’s Point-in-Time Count of homeless citizens has released its results. The 2018 numbers show an increase, with a total of 152 people experiencing homelessness compared to 127 people reported in 2017.

The study searches for the most accurate number of people either living on the streets or in a shelter any given night in Orange County. Corey Root, the Homeless Programs coordinator for the county, said finding this accurate number is of greater value than simply a low number.

“It’s a real waste of time, resources and everything else to go through this exercise and come out with a number that no one feels is right,” Root says. “We do feel very confident about this year’s number. We were not happy that it’s on the rise. We want to see the numbers go in the other direction. But we are happy that we’re confident that it’s an accurate number.”

Some numbers from the Point-in-Time Count are encouraging. The six percent return rate to homelessness qualifies as low, and Orange County has decreased its chronic homeless population by 50 percent since 2010.

But Root says the increasing numbers still reveal gaps in the service providers and programs available to the homeless. The standards to qualify for entry into Orange County’s men’s shelters are high, according to Root. She says her department wants to make changes that lower those barriers and make shelters more housing-centric.

“We’ve seen in other communities that if your shelter is really housing-focused, folks are transitioning out of homelessness into permanent housing much more quickly,” says Root. “With the proposed changes I see, we’d lower some of the barriers so people can get to the shelter more easily and then the program would change to a program that’s really housing-focused.”

Root also says that while the numbers may be increasing, she believes Orange County is in a good position to find solutions. She says just having a group like the county’s Partnership to End Homelessness coalition to create these programs makes a difference.

“There are a number of communities where it just falls to whoever is able to do this work,” says Root. “But in Orange County, for over 10 years, they’ve devoted significant local resources to having staff to do this systems-level coordination. I think that’s been really helpful to our work.”

The full Point-in-Time Count can be found on the Orange County Partnership to End Homelessness website.

Photo via Orange County Partnership to Ends Homelessness.