By rssfeeds-admin From dust until dawn, volunteers took to the streets to get an accurate count on the number of people experiencing homelessness in our area, while making sure they know what local resources are available. Jeff Scott, with the West Texas Homeless Network, says as one of those resources, their main goal is to ensure everyone has a place to stay.
“Our assumption is that before we can address problems that homeless or homeless neighbors may be experiencing, we need to get them housing first,” Scott said.
Last year, Abilene saw 211 homeless people from the ‘Point in Time’ count, with 125 of them living in a shelter. This year, Scott says he expects to see a rise in the number of homeless people in Abilene based on the current state of the economy.
“We’re expecting those numbers to go up, especially the unsheltered count, because housing costs are more unaffordable right now. There’s also less stock available, and programs have fewer slots available, so we’re seeing more folks who have no other option but to be out on the street,” Scott said.
Last year, the City of Abilene cleared out known homeless camps on city property, and Scott says that this initiative alongside several street and construction projects around town have left the homeless population with nowhere to go.
“If you shut down an encampment, those people have to go somewhere, and they’re just there’s no housing available. There’s no slots in programs either in shelters, so there’s there’s really no other alternative than to find a location that’s that’s temporary and unstable,” Scott said. “There’s not a part of the city that isn’t touched by this.”
The problem of homelessness in the city is not a foreign issue, according to City Council member Blaise Regan. He also says that street and development projects headed by the city, have made the issue more visible.
“The streets and the homeless issue are probably the top two that we hear about through email or just people stopping us on the street going, ‘Hey, this is an issue,” Regan said. “We’re seeing it more and more because of the projects that we’ve done. . . [like] the Cedar Creek Waterway Trail that went through an area that a lot of homeless lived in, and so it’s pushed them out into more visible positions. And so it’s not that we have more people, it’s that we have more visible people.”
Regan says he hopes to have some initiatives soon to help with homelessness in Abilene. He told KTAB/KRBC he wants to focus in two areas, lighting and bringing the nonprofits together.
“From a council perspective, it’s more lighting. I’m going to push for at the council retreat, having a position that is overarching over all the different homeless charities that are involved with the homeless so that we have one coordinator dealing with all the different issues,” Regan said.
The city council retreat will take place on January 31.
Results of the Place in Time count will highlight hot spots for homelessness in the area that can be used to get more federal funding to aid local resources.
Discover more from RSS Feeds Cloud
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.