By Jonathan Friedman
Lookout News

February 23, 2010 --For the second consecutive year, the number of homeless in Santa Monica has gone down. That is according to a Homeless Count conducted last month. The results were presented at last night’s Social Services Commission meeting.

There were 742 homeless people counted on Jan. 29 from 12 a.m. to 3 a.m. This includes 264 living on the streets; 423 in institutions such as shelters, hospitals, jails and hotels and another 53 located in cars, vans, RVs or encampments.

The number of homeless counted marks a 19 percent reduction from last year when 915 were found. Setareh Yavari, Santa Monica’s human services administrator, said a reason for the reduction includes progress on the City Council’s 2008 Action Plan to Address Homelessness, which serves a “smaller numbers of people more intensively.”

Other factors, Yavari said, include better collaboration and coordination of services and new housing subsidy and rental assistance programs. Also helping with the reduction are the Homeless Community Court, which offers social services to those facing criminal issues, and Project Homecoming, which seeks to return homeless people to their families.

“We’ve made great strides, but we have a lot more work to do going forward,” said John Maceri, executive director of OPCC, which provides housing and services to the low-income and homeless in Santa Monica. “So it’s important, especially in this next year, to keep up those efforts.”

More than 160 people participated in this year’s Homeless Count. It took place during the early morning hours because it is a time when people are less likely to be mobile and counting people twice can be avoided.

The largest homeless populations were found in downtown, the beach, as well as the Wilshire, Colorado and Olympic corridors.

A new database is being used to track the homeless, so it is known where the former homeless are going, and if they stay off the streets. Additionally, the City will be working with the US Census for a further population study.

No families were found living on the streets. There were some in shelters, and it is possible others could have been located in vehicles.

But vehicles were each counted as equaling one person. Julie Rusk, human services manager, said the lack of families on the streets is consistent with a 2005 Urban Institute study on Santa Monica’s homeless population.

“Our population is disproportionately single-adult and mentally ill or substance abusing, or both,” Rusk said. “That tends to be the population for the better part of the last two decades here in this city. That’s a different demographic description than the homeless population county-wide.”

However, David Snow, who heads Upward Bound House, a homeless housing nonprofit, said the number of homeless families in the Los Angeles region has gone up in the past six to 12 months.

“Families tend to be the hidden homeless in our community,” Snow said. “They tend not to be found with their children in alleys and on the street. So it’s not surprising in a lot of ways that the count did not pick them up.”

“Families tend to be the hidden homeless in our community,”
      David Snow

“Our population is disproportionately single-adult and mentally ill or substance abusing, or both,”
       Julie Rusk