SOUTH BEND — The number of people homeless in St. Joseph County dropped 9% from its 2020 high, data from an annual count released last week shows. But figures remain above levels from 2019 and years prior, and reported rates of serious mental illness and substance abuse continue to rise.
The 2022 count, held the night of Jan. 26 and into the next morning, found 469 people to be homeless in St. Joseph County. That’s nearly 50 fewer people than were counted at the beginning of 2020, when the tally showed 516 people were homeless.
Of the 469 people considered homeless, 36 were deemed “unsheltered,” which means they’re living in a place not meant for human habitation, like a car, tent or abandoned building. Emergency housing programs at sites such as the Center for the Homeless held 326 people, while transitional housing units hosted 107.
The annual count is a snapshot of one night in January and is mandated by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which also defines homelessness for participating agencies. To record the unsheltered population, six trained volunteers sought to find people from 5 p.m. to 1 a.m. Jan. 26 and early the next morning at well-known sites, primarily in South Bend. People living in shelters were counted by residential managers that day and added to the final tally.
Brendan Devitt, who leads the count and works for the Center for the Homeless, attributed the decrease to several factors.
Dozens of permanent supportive housing units have opened since 2020, most recently 22 units near Edison Park managed by the South Bend Heritage Foundation. Sites like Hope Avenue Homes combine income-based rental assistance with social services, like substance abuse recovery, to help people gain stability and increase their income.
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Devitt also cited work being done by Motels4Now, a county-funded program that began in 2020, to help people transition out of homelessness. The initiative uses a “housing first” approach, letting people stay at a motel northwest of downtown for months while supporting their efforts to find low-income housing.
And the Housing Authority of South Bend moves people who are homeless toward the top of its waitlist, which contains thousands of applicants, for its Housing Choice Voucher Program and its public housing units.
“We’ve just had a big push,” Devitt said, “so I think we’re kind of seeing the results of that over that two-year period.”
Troubling trends persist, however.
Of the known homeless population in St. Joseph County, 151 people have a serious mental illness and 155 have a substance use disorder. Those figures have increased since 2020, despite the overall decrease in homelessness.
Black residents continue to be at an inordinate risk of homelessness in the county, state and nation. While Black people comprise just 14% of St. Joseph County residents, they represent 40% of people experiencing homelessness.
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Disproportionate homelessness is also marked among American Indian or Indigenous residents, a tiny but growing portion of the county’s populace. They represent 1.5% of the homeless population but just 0.6% of the county. White residents make up 52% of people who are homeless but 79% of county residents.
“This is due to issues like systemic racism in housing as well as disparate access to health care, economic, and educational opportunities,” according to a state report accompanying the survey for Marion County.
About 100 people in St. Joseph County experience chronic homelessness, defined by HUD as affecting those who have had a disability and have been homeless for a consecutive year or at least four times in the past three years, where the total time spent homeless exceeds 12 months. The 98 people included this year are 17 more than the figure for 2020.
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Devitt acknowledges the count finds the vast majority of people who are homeless stay in South Bend. One of four South Bend residents are Black, meaning the group is still overrepresented based on the city’s population.
“That is something we’re looking to improve on in future counts: locating and looking to do a count of people outside of South Bend,” Devitt said.
The downward trend in homelessness aligns with a 9% decrease in Marion County, Indiana’s most populous county, where 1,761 people were counted this January. The number of people homeless in Indiana has fallen by 8.6% since 2020, going from 4,037 to 3,691.
State data for 2021 seemed to indicate a stunning decrease in St. Joseph County, but Devitt said it should be disregarded as “extremely flawed” because the count was hindered by the surging COVID-19 pandemic.
South Bend allotted $650,000 to directly address homelessness in 2022, though an additional $5.8 million of federal American Rescue Plan money goes toward bolstering county social service programs.
While the city's support for weather amnesty continues to be its largest budget item, the Homelessness Implementation Group, formed in August 2020, is working to implement a list of proposals.A permanent low-barrier intake shelter, similar to the annually renewed Motels4Now program, and a full-time countywide coordinator to help people navigate the web of homeless services are atop that list.
Two contract-based city employees, acting as homeless coordinators split $75,000 a year over the last two years. Their work was supposed to finish this month but has been extended without additional pay to Sept. 5, said Jordan Gathers, South Bend Mayor James Mueller's point person on homelessness. Funding for a full-time coordinator may come next.
"It’s encouraging to see that the numbers seem to be decreasing. That’s positive," Gathers said. "But (we) understand that we do have a long way to go, and the job’s not finished.”
Email South Bend Tribune city reporter Jordan Smith at JTsmith@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter:@jordantsmith09
