Calgary social agencies to tally homeless count
For the first time in four years, key tool being used to help city's planning efforts
Calgary's social agencies will hit the streets Tuesday night with the aim of tallying how many people in the city are experiencing homelessness.
About 100 volunteers from 16 organizations will canvass the city to perform the point-in-time homelessness count, looking to update the estimate of Calgary's unhoused population.
The initiative takes place every other year, but the 2022 head count will be the first in four years, after the COVID -19 pandemic cancelled efforts in 2020.
It's a valuable tool for planning as well as assessing progress in the fight against homelessness, said Patricia Jones, CEO of Calgary Homeless Foundation.
“As the guide to fight homelessness in our city, this is an important collaborative initiative that will inform our planning activities going forward to ensure we have the support systems and programs in place that meet the need of a diverse homeless population,” Jones said in a news release.
In 2018, the last year for which point-in-time data is available, there were 2,911 people experiencing homelessness in Calgary, a number which at the time represented a decrease in the city's unhoused population.
But the head of one outreach agency participating in the Tuesday census says he expects this year's number will trend higher.
“Our numbers have only gone up. We've seen an increase in folks experiencing homelessness when we do street outreach,” Chaz Smith, founder of Bethechangeyyc, told Postmedia.
“Citizens often tell us they see folks experiencing homelessness far more often. This has become a sort of in-your-face topic, where you can't avoid it anymore. From what we hear and what we see, I believe the number will be higher.”
The number of unhoused Calgarians accessing services skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic, Smith said.
Those performing the count Tuesday will split off into different parts of the city, aiming to cover ground for as close to a comprehensive tally as possible.
The process also involves a survey, asking unhoused Calgarians demographic questions, as well as details like how long they've been homeless.
“It will be difficult to find a lot of these encampments, and I know that we will be missing many folks. That will just be a given,” Smith said. “Tracking down camps and folks sleeping outside is a tough job.”
The count also involves collecting administrative data from spaces like shelters and transitional housing facilities, as well as systems data from government offices.
The 2018 point-in-time homeless count was conducted in six other Alberta cities in addition to Calgary. Each city uses the same methodology for their count.
It found there were 5,735 homeless people in those cities at the time of the count, meaning Calgary accounted for more than half of Alberta's unhoused population.
Within Calgary, 72 per cent of those surveyed in 2018 were male. Seven per cent were military or RCMP veterans, and 20 per cent identified as Indigenous, despite Indigenous people making up only three per cent of Calgary's general population.
A recent University of Calgary report found Calgary housing first programs are finding success in combating homelessness in the city, with more than half of clients between 2012 and 2017 remaining housed after four years.
A 2020 joint study from the Calgary Homeless Foundation and the U of C's School of Public Policy found a person experiencing homelessness in Calgary cost the public an average of $87,000 a year, largely through access to institutions like hospitals and jails.
That number dropped to an average of $30,500 yearly after they were placed in a home.