2011 State of Hawaii Homeless Persons Point-In-Time County Report

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Background and Project Overview The annual Continuum of Care (CoQ Application for McKinney -Vento homeless assistance funding requires CoCs to produce "statistically reliable, unduplicated counts or estimates of homeless persons in sheltered and unsheltered locations on a one -day point in time ". The rural counties sheltered count was conducted on the night of January 25, 2011. The unsheltered count was performed from January 26th through the 31St', based on the question, "Where did you sleep on the night of January 25 ?" The Sheltered Point in Time Count (PIT) requires CoCs to report the number of sheltered homeless persons in seven subpopulation categories. These subpopulation categories include: chronically homeless, severely mentally ill, chronic substance abusers, veterans, persons with HIV /AIDS, victims of domestic violence, and unaccompanied youth (under 18 years of age). Additionally, the unsheltered PIT requires CoCs to report the number of unaccompanied homeless persons who are chronically homeless. The unsheltered homeless are an extremely important subpopulation of homeless persons and their characteristics and needs must be accommodated within any strategy to reduce homelessness. Collecting good baseline data about this subpopulation is essential to understanding the causes of homelessness and can be used as a basis for comparison in future years. Moreover, continued data collection at regular intervals is necessary to track progress toward reducing homelessness and to track changes in the demographics of the unsheltered homeless. The 2011 Statewide PIT was performed to meet the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) requirement for its CoC Homeless Assistance Programs grant application. The Homeless Point in Time Count was conducted throughout the nation in the last week of January 2011. The City & County of Honolulu, Department of Community Services (DCS) and the State of Hawaii, Department of Human Services, Homeless Programs Office collaborated to develop the methodology for the count and worked diligently with homeless service providers to plan the logistics and develop the survey instruments in accordance with HUD guidelines. Objectives The objective of this PIT was to obtain accurate statewide information on sheltered and unsheltered homeless populations on January 25, 2011 in conjunction with: Obtaining an overall count of homeless individuals and households in specific subpopulations; Obtaining an estimate of the number of homeless singles and households without children and homeless households with children; • Obtaining an estimate of the number of chronically homeless individuals according to HUD's definition of chronically homeless.' The 2011 unsheltered PIT made use of the State's Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) to a greater extent than did the 2009 and 2010 PIT Counts. The 2011 count improved upon the methodology employed in the previous year by providing an unsheltered PIT module that allowed users to enter surveys directly into the HMIS. The HMIS is a statewide database that was established in 2002 for recording homeless client intake, and service data in an accurate and uniform manner in order to track program outputs and outcomes for reporting and funding purposes. All homeless service providers receiving funding through the City and County of Honolulu, the 1 HUD's definition of chronic homelessness is: An unaccompanied homeless individual with a disabling condition who has either been continuously homeless for a year or more OR has had at least four (4) episodes of homelessness in the past three (3) years. To be considered chronically homeless, persons must have been sleeping in a place not meant for human habitation (e.g., living on the streets) and /or in emergency shelter during that time.