Whatcom County’s Point-In-Time homeless count may decrease this year compared to 2023’s count — but it doesn’t mean fewer people are unhoused.
While widely considered an undercount, the annual numbers, to be released in June, provide some understanding of who is homeless in the community. Last year, Whatcom County reported 1,059 individuals, the highest number since the census began in 2008.
Whatcom Homeless Service Center director Teri Bryant said on April 11 that numbers are likely to go down, but not because of less homelessness.
More people than normal refused to participate in the survey this year, Bryant said, a point echoed by Ferndale Community Services Director Sara O’Connor in a county Housing Advisory Committee meeting.
“People are really, really tired of providing this personal information every year and not getting served,” Bryant said, adding that it’s an understandable, human reaction.
The annual count is a national effort to provide one metric measuring homelessness in communities by attempting to survey all sheltered and unsheltered homeless people. It’s required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
Whatcom County health department staff, outreach teams and volunteers surveyed people staying in emergency shelters and transitional housing programs on the night of Jan. 25. In the following few days, staff surveyed people across the county who were unsheltered outside on the 25th. Counting every single person, including those who sleep outside, is a difficult task, especially in late January. HUD sets the date.
Homeless Outreach Team Coordinator Marisa Schoeppach said in the past they’ve had people run up to them to make sure they’re counted, but this year marked a shift in people’s interest in participating.
Bryant said she thinks this has been exacerbated by the fentanyl crisis — people aren’t interested in filling out a survey when they’re deep in the addiction cycle. Outreach teams don’t currently provide any incentives to people who fill out the form, but Bryant said that might be something they consider going forward.
Another challenge is finding people. Bryant said it’s particularly hard to locate people living in their vehicles.
“There’s been an effort to relocate people who live in certain areas in their vehicles, and many of them have left the city limits, are in other areas, are not identified, or are constantly moving,” she said at the committee meeting. “So that’s been difficult.”
The third reason: “Our clients are dying,” Bryant said.
The Whatcom Homeless Service Center keeps an unofficial count of homeless deaths — last year, they counted 85 deaths. This year, they’ve already collected 33 names of homeless people who died, as of April 11.
“The people that we’re losing are people that outreach workers have been working with for years and that’s just absolutely traumatic,” Bryant said.
Efficacy of the Point-in-Time count
Bryant said she doesn’t think the Point-in-Time count serves the community.
“Anyone who looks at this Point-in-Time count without any context for the complexity and what it’s like to experience homelessness is going to say, ‘This is garbage. Homelessness is everywhere,’” Bryant said. “And those folks are absolutely right. Homelessness is everywhere.”
Other metrics can provide a clearer picture of the need for affordable housing in the community.
The housing pool, called Coordinated Entry, received 1,097 applications from households in 2023, Bryant said, noting the number would be much higher if individuals applied. She said they’re on track to surpass that number in 2024. Since 2017, they’re able to serve, on average, 116 households per quarter.
Homeless numbers from schools in the county also provide some insight. At the beginning of the 2023-24 school year, 1,120 students enrolled in Whatcom County schools were considered homeless, according to Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction data.
“Homeless,” under this definition, means all students lacking a “fixed, regular and adequate nighttime residence.” That includes children doubled-up with another family to prevent becoming literally homeless, and households residing in a hotel or motel that is paid with private funding.
Bryant said she hopes people look beyond the numbers, and look at homelessness for the “complexity that it is.”
“The number is not what’s impactful, the impact was suffering and trauma that we see every day.”
Charlotte Alden is CDN’s general assignment/enterprise reporter; reach her at charlottealden@cascadiadaily.com; 360-922-3090 ext. 123.
