The Lake County Continuum of Care (CoC) recently announced the results of this year’s Point in Time Count, the annual homeless tally in the County of Lake which resulted in a decrease of the homeless count from a year ago. After completing over 300 overall surveys, it was reported 241 people met the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s definition of experiencing homelessness in the County.
However, according to a presentation of the findings to the CoC board by Chairperson Rev. Shannon Kimbell-Auth earlier this month, some of the figures may be skewed in part due to the CoC switching from paper and pencil/pen to a digital application this year and partly due to the HUD’s official definition of a homeless individual which exempts a good number of the County’s population.
For example, Kimbell-Auth pointed to some inconsistencies due to the way the digital software used for the count handled the geographic locations. Moreover, she talked about the official definition excluding many instances people traditionally think of as homeless. “Doubled up doesn’t count, couch surfing doesn’t count, being in a motel doesn’t count, so many of us know that people that are living in those realities are experiencing homelessness but that’s not what HUD is looking for leading to radical differences in terms of numbers,” she said. This explains a disparity in the count of homeless vets for example. Although 26 were surveyed, the official count sent to HUD is only 16.
We think it’s a shame that we can’t arrive at a more accurate count and although we give kudos to the more than 63 volunteers and sites which worked hard to conduct this year’s count in spite of less than ideal conditions, (foul weather and the biggest snowstorm in a decade coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic made it a challenging effort for all those involved) a bigger effort should be made to convince the federal government to allow more resources, or at the very least expand their definition of homelessness, in order for counties and states to achieve a more accurate picture.
There are also a number of unanswered questions still surrounding homelessness in the County. Some of these were initially raised by the Civil Grand Jury in their 2019-2020 Report. For instance, even though last year’s PIT Count found 572 homeless residents, Partnership Health recorded nearly 4,000 self-reported homeless people in 2019. As pointed out then, this is a significant difference in the number between the two counts. A difference of approximately 2,500 people!
As the Grand Jury correctly pointed out, in previous years there has been a vast difference between the PIT Count and the count from these other entities which affects the amount of money coming into the County dedicated to addressing the problem. This year continues the trend as it was reportedly difficult to find people out in the field during the inclement weather on the day the “snapshot” was captured.
The good news is that there are a few more shelters in the County which were not operating a year ago. A lot has changed since the last time the PIT Count took place including the infusion of COVID-19 funding, some of which was utilized to keep the unsheltered population from spreading the virus and making the pandemic worse for the overall population.
“We did house people this year,” Kimbell-Auth said adding, “Last year Hope Center hadn’t been open, last year Elijah house hadn’t been open,” and pointed out Project Restoration and the North Coast Opportunities nonprofit also housed people. “We want to see a reduction in those numbers as we go forward even when we don’t believe that our numbers are fully capturing the number of people experiencing homelessness,” she concluded.
We don’t wholly concur. We agree with the Grand Jury’s finding that there appears to be “a dramatic under-counting of the homeless population in the County” for the reasons stated previously and many others, and it would behoove the County to address these disparities with state and federal officials in order to gain a clearer picture of the true nature of the severity of the problem in our county. In his response to this finding last year, Todd Metcalf, director of the County’s Behavioral Services Department, noted he agreed with this finding, but in his response to the recommended action for all the entities involved to collaborate towards a more accurate means to determine the types and amounts of needed services, Metcalf pointed to the difficulty of hiring even at the highest pay step allowed, which he said “is still less than the same positions in other counties and local organizations.”
What’s not changed from a year ago is the fact that there is a severe lack of low income housing available in the County, undoubtedly exacerbated by COVID-19. That’s something the survey respondents pointed to in an overwhelming margin in answer to what they thought was “most needed.” How about we start with coming up with a unified estimate form the CoC, LCOE, county and city governance and the other partner organizations as recommended in the Grand Jury’s Report?
—The Editorial Board, Lake County Record Bee
