You may see them sleeping under bridges, camping out in makeshift shelters along the Willamette River or heading back to the shelters that they call “home,” but the homeless population in Lane County isn’t always visible.
But just how many homeless people reside in Lane County?
The One Night Homeless Count, conducted by Lane County officials, found that on any given night in Lane County there can be 2,111 homeless people found sleeping on the streets or living in shelters, slightly down from last year’s count of 2,278. The study also stated the actual number could be much higher because 8,813 homeless individuals sought social services through Lane County Human Services Commission during the 2007 calendar year.
This year’s number of homeless people in the county, made up of everyone from life-long wanderers to children to families recently fallen on hard times, comprises a population that is larger than that of at least 55 percent of Oregon’s cities, but could be bigger than 78 percent of cities in the state if the higher estimate is accurate.
Of Oregon’s 236 cities, only 106 have more than 2,111 people, and only 53 cities have more than 8,813 residents.
But the 6,702-person gap in these two numbers may cause some to wonder how so many people could be uncounted, but the One Night Homeless Count Supervisor Pearl Wolfe said the social services figures “captures different pieces of (homelessness)” because a number of homeless may be “hidden away.”
The report also stated that 1,965 children in Lane County schools were homeless in the 2006-07 school year.
The count is a compilation of a “street count” in January 2007 that found 594 “unsheltered individuals living on the street.” Added to that was the recent January 2008 count of 1,517 individuals seeking or living in shelters.
Of all the shelters in the county, the Eugene Mission had the largest population at 343 people staying at the mission on the time of the survey.
Eugene Mission Assistant Director Lynn Antis said the count is “a means of the state for distributing its money; counties with more homeless get more money.”
The counts are required by the Federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, which provides nearly $2 million in housing and services to the homeless in Lane County.
The majority of homeless people are not wanderers or drug addicts, but people who have suffered an acute life crisis such as divorce, domestic violence, eviction, job loss or a medial crisis, according to the report.
Many people just have a hard time finding a home to rent as vacancy rates are extremely low in the area.
According to Stephanie Jennings, the housing finance analyst for Eugene, the city “has had a low vacancy rate of 2 percent for the past couple of years, so it’s hard for homeless people to find a place to live.”
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