Homelessness in US was ‘devastating’ before pandemic. Covid likely made the crisis worse

The number of people experiencing homelessness across the US has grown for the fourth year in a row, according to a snapshot of the nation’s crisis from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

On a single night in January 2020, two months before the declaration of the coronavirus pandemic, roughly 580,000 people – or about 18 of every 10,000 people in the US – were experiencing homelessness, a more than 2 per cent increase from 2019.

“What makes these findings even more devastating is that they are based on data even before Covid-19, and we know the pandemic has only made the homelessness crisis worse,” HUD secretary Marcia Fudge said in a video statement with the report.

Roughly 60 per cent of people captured in the report were in shelters or transitional housing programmes, and nearly 40 per cent were unsheltered, staying in abandoned buildings and other structures.

That marks the first time since the government began the annual count that the number of single adults living outside has exceeded the number of people living in shelters.

The overall increase is also marked by a 7 per cent increase among unsheltered people from 2019, and a 15 per cent increase among people experiencing chronic homelessness.

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Unsheltered people in families with children also increased for the first time since data collection began – more than 106,000 children were experiencing homeless during the time of the report, including 11,000 children who were living outside.

The rate of homelessness among veterans did not decline for the first time in more than a decade.

People of colour are “significantly overrepresented” among people experiencing homelessness, according to the report, which follows similar trends from previous years.

Black Americans accounted for 39 per cent of all people experiencing homelessness in the report, and 53 per cent of people experiencing homelessness as members of families with children, despite making up 12 per cent of the total US population.

“The 2020 report provides a deeply troubling accounting of homelessness in the United States,” said Nan Roman, president and CEO of the National Alliance to End Homelessness. “They show a system under resourced to meet the needs of people experiencing and at risk of homelessness, much less the coming consequences of the global pandemic and recession.”

Secretary Fudge, homelessness agencies and providers have pointed to an unprecedented aid package as part of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan recently signed into law by Joe Biden to provide significant support to combat the crisis.

“As a nation we have a moral responsibility to end homelessness, and we know how to do it,” including “permanent housing without restrictions”, the secretary said.

The relief legislation contains $5 billion for emergency housing vouchers and services for people experiencing or at risk of homelessness, and more than $20 billion in emergency rental aid.

Ms Fudge’s position is in stark contrast to housing and homelessness agencies under former President Donald Trump’s administration, which largely rejected the “housing first” model that centres access to permanent, stable housing, rather than treating housing as a reward.

Her predecessor Ben Carson said he was “looking for ways to work around the system” despite congressionally approved funding for policies guided by that approach.

“Housing first” has been widely supported by homelessness and housing agencies and services across the US, and it was the driving force behind federal approaches to address the crisis for more than a decade – until Mr Trump.

Robert Marbut, the man appointed to lead the Trump administration’s federal response to the crisis, rejected that framework. He has endorsed housing as an incentive to enrol people into supportive services.

Mr Marbut left his role as executive director of United States Interagency Council on Homelessness last month.