Homeless Update: About the Numbers

With federal, state and local governments allocating billions of dollars to the problems of homelessness, I contend that there is adequate incentive for some people to portray the extent of homelessness to be larger than it actually is.

Only a few decades ago, the homeless were called bums in violation of anti-vagrancy laws and run out of town. A few good-hearted groups tried to help the vagrants, funded by the kindness of strangers.

Then liberal politicians, aided by liberal media-types, saw that by calling the bums homeless people instead of bums, the vagrancy problem could be used as a political issue. Imagine a stump speech:

"Neighbors, there's a lot of good in this city but a stinking stain remains because the sitting mayor has done nothing to help our most vulnerable citizens -- the homeless."

Like quarter-a-gallon gas, homelessness was sold as a winning political issue for the liberals and it took off. With the help of a compliant media, the homeless issue was raised in prominence and soon state legislatures and Congress got wind and were encouraged to fork over billions of dollars.

Following the decision to dump taxpayer funds to the squeaky wheel of homelessness, the subject of accounting became important. Officials wanted the homeless counted to determine where to send money to provide the help needed. Unfortunately, that task is easier said than done. Advocates screamed that they could count but it wouldn't be representative. Instead, the homeless population would be estimated based on best guesses.

The estimates were considered valid for a short while but then it became obvious, through simple observation by officials and the public, that the best guesses could not possibly be near the truth. A notorious example occurred in Chicago in 2004 where 80,000 homeless were estimated and a census found less than 1,000.

With estimates of homelessness losing credibility, localities were forced to count people to justify receiving funds from the pot of gold. Now, virtually every community with more than a dozen or so homeless people conducts a yearly census. The number derived, however, isn't considered accurate until it has been massaged.

Homeless advocates rightly claim that it is impossible to get an exact count by taking a census. That's a fact and it's because homeless populations are dynamic with people arriving, people leaving, people finding homes and people losing homes continuously. And since an exact count doesn't adequately quantify the homeless problem, advocates throw in a correction factor which is apparently pulled out of the sky. Frequently, a multiplier is used. Four is common. So, if 150 homeless are identified in the census, typically, a corrected count of 600 is reported.

Furthermore, there's another problem with censuses of homeless people. There exists no one universal understanding of "homeless." Last I heard, Congress is working on an interpretation. Right now it seems that each locale relies upon its own criteria. Here's an example of the definition of homelessness from Dougherty County, Georgia:

[It] applies to an individual who lacks an adequate nighttime residence. This could mean those living on the street, which is referred to as unsheltered homelessness. It also includes the sheltered homeless, which is defined as those living in alternative housing such as shelters or hotels. Both are contained within the homeless count.

Frankly, I wouldn't consider people living in hotels as homeless. After all, Howard Hughes lived in a hotel for several years before he died and he was filthy rich and definitely not in need of a taxpayer-funded handout.

And, here's more to the same definition:

The count also includes those who are classified as precariously housed, or those living with someone else. It can also include those facing housing loss within a week and those in nonpermanent housing such as prisons or hospitals.

Maybe a reader can explain that blurb because it doesn't make a lot of sense to me. It does, however, reflect an administrative expansion of the scope of the homeless problem. More people have been pencil-whipped into the realm of homelessness.

In any event, using the above criteria, the Dougherty County population of homeless is 75.

Based on the Dougherty County homeless count conducted for 2008, 71 percent of those homeless were sheltered while 20 percent were unsheltered. Of the individuals for whom data on race was available, 78 were African African and 18 were white. Of those identified as homeless (sheltered or unsheltered), 25 of the 75 respondents indicated they had been homeless more than a year.

Therefore, of the 75 people identified as homeless, 78 were African-American and 18 were white. Inexplicably, nine percent were in some undefined state -- neither sheltered nor unsheltered. Okay, readers, make sense of that.

One last point, the federal budget for homelessness is around $2 billion a year. That's a lot of cabbage being made available and distributed largely based on homeless (as corrected) census numbers. Remember the following because it's important.

The people who generally provide the homeless numbers, which determine the amount of cabbage to be distributed, are the same people who receive the cabbage.

Consider a politician, who garners votes based upon his record, as having a natural inclination to exaggerate. Exaggeration by a politician means more votes. Exaggeration by homeless advocates garners more cabbage.

I'm not alleging fraud by homeless advocates but I am alleging fudge, an enormous amount of fudge.

In conclusion, fifty years ago some bums were on America's city streets. That problem has been solved. The bums were renamed as homeless, the definition of homeless was expanded to include hundreds of thousands of people who never were bums, and a massive government giveaway program was created.

To be boldly honest, the bum population of fifty years ago still exists, with new bums, probably equal in number or more, on the same city streets. The liberal solution solved nothing but led to an expansion of government and a two billion taxpayer-dollar per year welfare giveaway.

Liberalism: Making more people dependent on government day by day -- following the road to serfdom.