Oregon leads nation in unsheltered families, youth, according to 2023 point in time count

SALEM, Ore. — The latest Point in Time (PIT) count data shows Oregon is leading the nation in the rate of unsheltered, unaccompanied homeless youth and unsheltered homeless families. It is now second only to California in the rate of unsheltered overall homelessness.

The data is based on a one-time count, usually conducted in January, of all individuals experiencing homelessness. States are required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to submit the data every year.

A snapshot of that data shows overall homelessness in Oregon increased by 12.15% from 2022 to 2023 (from 17,959 to 20,142). It increased by 22.5% since the start of the pandemic, one of the nation's largest spikes.

With 48 out of every 10,000 residents experiencing homelessness, the Beaver state is also among those with the overall highest rates of homelessness per capita.

"I think a lot of us who have been doing the work expected this after the pandemic, and we had been warning people for a long time," said Jimmy Jones, executive director of the Mid-Willamette Valley Community Action Agency. "With each passing opportunity that we get to measure the (homeless) population, it continues to grow unfortunately."

Gov. Tina Kotek blames a lack of affordable housing and pandemic-era social distancing measures that decreased capacity at shelters statewide.

"We had a challenge before the pandemic started, and it just exacerbated it. If you were homeless in 2019, as you had just ended up having to be on the streets, and then you were told, 'OK, just wait for three years, live in your tent for three years,' that level of chronic homelessness is very difficult to build your way out of," she said. "We have created a very difficult situation for people here because of the pandemic, and it's going to take some time to build out of it."

Jones also blames the pandemic but attributes the problem more to inflation and increasing rents than the efforts to minimize COVID exposure that shelters took in 2020 and 2021. He says that reflects in the demographic that saw some of the biggest increases according to the PIT count data.

"If you look at who are the folks most likely to lose their homes as a result of spiking rental prices, it is families, people who are living on the margin, people who just do not have the adequate resources to stay in their home," he said.

The PIT count snapshot notes that 713 more families became homeless and unsheltered in 2023. It also notes that 358 more unaccompanied youth were experiencing unsheltered homelessness when compared to 2022 data.

That data also does not account for families and youth that may be doubling up, couch surfing or are simply uncounted.Rural service providers have been vocal about difficulties conducting accurate PIT counts because of expansive coverage areas, decentralized resource networks and a lack of volunteers to conduct the count.

Despite those challenges, the PIT count data from 2023 shows most families and youth who are unsheltered and homeless are in Oregon's rural counties.

"Oregon historically has done very poorly on a lot of youth issues. We have had a foster care crisis in this state for some time -- a lot of choices in that system that just didn't seem to make a whole lot of sense; it has been inadequately funded," Jones said. "We have had no real support for youth sheltering in Oregon until the last couple of years."

Jones believes a lack of legislative action over the years coupled with skyrocketing rent and overall inflation is what's causing the increase in overall homelessness.

"In order to have an adequate shelter stock in Oregon, we are going to have to find ways to pay for it, and it has only really been in the last three years when you have started to see some significant investments by the state in terms of developing not only adequate shelter stock but shelter stock that meets the needs of the people who are outside," he said.

Jones is not confident that the PIT count numbers will allow more federal HUD funding to flow in the right direction.

"HUD's distribution methodology is really focused on a block grant system that rewards large cities, not necessarily whether they have a homeless population of size or not but generally based on a competitive performance model that really just distributed funds across the U.S.," he said. "All of our answers are going to have to be local answers. The state Legislature has it within its capacity to dedicate funds that are necessary here to fund all aspects of the housing and homelessness continuum. It has just chosen not to do so in the past."

Jones said the historic investment that lawmakers made in 2023 toward solving the homeless crisis is barely keeping up with the need. He said what would make the biggest difference is a stable source of funding that does not change or alter with the politics of the time.