Vancouver skips homeless count for second year in a row, disappointing local advocates

For the second straight year, Vancouver is not conducting a homeless count in the city, disappointing some groups that rely on data to provide services for homeless people.

“When we don’t know anything and we don’t know what kind of impacts COVID-19 has had through data, it becomes difficult to know if we are doing the right things to really try to fight homelessness, addiction and poverty,” says Nicole Mucci, Communications Manager at Union Gospel Mission.

“Without this really important count, we’re kind of left guessing, and using our own anecdotal evidence.”

1800 meals. 1500 lbs. of turkey, dozens of litres of gravy. A lifetime of connections and holiday memories. On @CityNewsVAN we’re catching up w/the @ugm as it serves it’s #Christmas meal — it’s the 6th holiday meal they’ve served ‘to go’ because of the #COVID19 pandemic. pic.twitter.com/VMQ2I1GDSX

— Ria ‘Hall-y Jolly’ Renouf (@riarenouf) December 5, 2021

Mucci says the municipal government is missing the opportunity to see how the homeless population has been affected by the pandemic.

“Anecdotally, we know at the UGM that our shelter, despite having increased the number of beds we’re using every single night, is seeing more turnaways, and we have more people trying to come access the shelter than we did before,” says Mucci.

“But we haven’t been able to say with certainty if homelessness has increased, and if it’s increased as a direct result of COVID-19. Or as a direct result of the many different factors or barriers that people often experience. So that’s really difficult.”

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The homeless count in Vancouver has been conducted by hundreds of volunteers since 2002, and 2022 is the second year it has been cancelled.

The city says it decided not to do the count in 2021 because of the need to minimize the transmission of COVID-19.

In lieu of a count, the city used other data sources, checking shelter occupancy, no-fixed-address data from the Vancouver Police, and income assistance data.

In a statement, the City of Vancouver says the alternative indicators suggest the level of homelessness is “approximately the same, and there does not appear to be a reduction in the need for services.”

But it acknowledges the alternative data sources “unfortunately do not provide a reliable proxy.”

“The homeless counts have sometimes been criticized because they’re not always accurate,” says Mucci.

“They’re known to be a bit of an undercount. But the reality is, is that an undercount is still at least letting us know what the absolute baseline of people experiencing homelessness is. And if we know this is the minimum, and it’s likely many more, we can start from there.”

The next time Vancouver is scheduled to participate in the regional homeless count will be March 2023.