‘It’s Going To Take All Of Us’: Homeless Count Begins In LA

VENICE, CA — Thousands of volunteers across Los Angeles County hit the streets overnight in cold weather to start the 2022 homeless count — the first such count since the pandemic hit more than two years ago.

This is the largest homeless count in the U.S. and calls on community members and professionals to locate people experiencing homelessness living on the streets, in tents and vehicles, and make sure they are counted. The count continues through Thursday night.

Since 2016, the Los Angeles Continuum of Care, which is overseen by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, has conducted an unsheltered street count each year to better understand homelessness across the county. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development requires a count every other year.

But safety concerns around the COVID-19 virus stopped the count during the pandemic. Now, the count begins again.

It requires volunteers and professionals to work together to gather critical data on who the unhoused are, what they need and how they can be supported, said Heidi Marston, executive director of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority.

Volunteers are still needed to help.

"I’m asking the people of LA County to join us because we all have a role to play in addressing this crisis, we still need volunteers to go into their community and count unsheltered neighbors so if you're interested visit theycountwillyou.org," Marston said.

Programs like this can help provide future funding for housing solutions, including programs such as Project Roomkey and Project Homekey. These programs allow the city to purchase former motels and hotels, then convert them to housing for unsheltered community members.

So far, more than 10,000 people in the county have received shelter at hotels and motels through Project Roomkey, Marston said.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, who has participated in the count since 2005, described how the count is something that the city and county badly missed during the pandemic and how it's time to apply the emergency response in the pandemic to the humanitarian crisis happening with the city's unhoused people.

Both federal and state funding remains a top priority to help provide solutions to homelessness, he said. That's why the count is so important.

"We know we can't get more money if we don't count people where they are," Garcetti said.

In the 2022 count, the volunteers will also drive instead of walking compared to the past. An app is designed for volunteers to gather data.

It's one step of many to come next. It's important work, Supervisor Holly Mitchell said. She thanked volunteers for working during these unprecedented times — in a pandemic and also in very chilly weather — to count unhoused neighbors.

"This is a moral crisis that the government, private sector philanthropists can't end in isolation," Mitchell said. "It's going to take all of us."

"Without your commitment and heroic efforts, we cannot make a meaningful impact on this crisis," Mitchell said.

"By counting our unhoused neighbors, we are sending a clear message again that every Angeleno matters," she said. "We will not give up this fight, we cannot until every single person sleeping on our streets is housed and safe."

Supervisor Sheila Kuehl thanked the volunteers for stepping up and addressing the challenges. The information gathered will give leaders more information about who is unhoused and how to direct resources. They want to know why and how people became homeless.

She also stressed the work that has been done and the challenges ahead.

"Over the last five years, we have actually placed over 75,000 of our residents in permanent housing and over 100,000 in shelter," Kuehl said. "So why are we still looking around and still seeing so many homeless people on the streets? We need to understand the causation. What is it that makes people homeless?"

The count will help answer some of these questions and find out if rising rents or loss of jobs are contributing factors, among others. Volunteers will interview people and find out their stories, then share that information following the count.

It's the next step, she said.

"I know everybody is still frustrated that we haven’t found housing for everyone," she said. "We’re frustrated, too."

"I hope as you count people on the street tonight, in doorways, in tents, in their cars, it’s important that you not lose sight of how much we have achieved because you can't lose hope," she said.

There's more work to be done.

"We have accomplished a lot, we have a lot to do," Kuehl said.

Community members can learn more and sign up to volunteer for the 2022 homeless count on the website.