Northern Michigan homeless advocates say housing-first policies work. But feds could cut funding
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A week ago, teams of volunteers and homeless service providers fanned out across northwest Michigan, armed with flashlights, supplies and clipboards, searching for people experiencing homelessness.
TheeffortwaspartoftheannualPoint-In-Timecount—anationwidesurveyconductedeachJanuarytoestimatehowmanypeopleareexperiencinghomelessnessonasinglenight.ThedatahelpstheU.S.DepartmentofHousingandUrbanDevelopmenttracktrendsanddeterminehowfederalfundingisdistributed.
Whilethecountitselfhasn’tchanged,howHUDmayusethatdatacouldsoonlookverydifferent.
“[It’s]notreallyacensus,butjustaone-nightsnapshot,”saidAshleyHalladay-Schmandt,directoroftheNorthwestMichiganCoalitiontoEndHomelessness.
Thisyear’spreliminarycountshowed25peoplelivingwithoutshelterinnorthwestlowerMichigan.Thatnumberislowerthanpeopleexperiencinghomelessness,abroadertermthatencompassespeopleinunstablelivingsituations,livingattemporarysheltersandmore.Thatnumbe
