Modesto area’s latest homeless count for 2024 is in. What stories do they tell?

This year’s annual count of homeless people in Stanislaus County tallied 2,052 men, women and children staying in emergency shelters, government-paid motel rooms and transitional housing, as well as sleeping in cars, parks and elsewhere outdoors.

The total was slightly less than the 2023 count of 2,091 people.

The Stanislaus Community System of Care conducts these annual counts in late January over a 24-hour period. The system of care consists of local governments, homeless service providers and others.

Forty-eight percent of those counted were living outdoors.

The results from the 2024 count are preliminary, but no major changes are expected when the final and full report is released in the coming weeks, according to a statement on behalf of the system of care.

Modesto is home to the majority of the county’s homeless people, and the 2024 count reflected that. Seventy-nine percent of those counted reside in Modesto. That’s 1,622 people. And nearly 80% of them ae in the 95351 and 95354 ZIP codes, which include west Modesto, downtown, La Loma, the airport neighborhood and Yosemite Boulevard.

While Modesto has had some success tackling homelessness, including its Camp2Home program , it has made slow progress on other projects. That includes the city setting aside $3 million six months ago for tiny homes to provide temporary, transitional housing.

So far, city officials have not brought any projects to the City Council for approval, though initially they had hoped to bring a project forward by April. And a proposal for 20 tiny homes at the Church of the Brethren was suspended in the face of strong opposition from neighbors.

These point-in-time counts are held in communities nationwide. The Department of Housing and Urban Development requires them as part of allocating funding to address homelessness. But the count also helps in developing services and housing for the homeless. The final report for 2024 will include extensive demographic information about those who were counted.

HUD calls them point-in-time counts because they provide a snapshot of homelessness and are not a definitive picture of a community’s homeless population.

The results can be affected by a number of factors, including the number of volunteers who participate and how well a count is organized. In the past five years, the results have ranged from a low of 1,857 in 2022 to a high of 2,957 in 2021.

And critics say HUD’s definition of homelessness , and therefore who should be counted, does not include people who are couch surfing or paying for their own motel rooms. (The PIT count does include people staying in government-paid motel rooms.)

Besides the 1,622 people in Modesto, the count found these numbers in these communities:

▪ Turlock — 201 people

▪ Empire — 67 people

▪ Patterson — 61 people

▪ Riverbank — 28 people

▪ Oakdale — 26 people

▪ Ceres — 22 people

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