Oahu homeless shelter space decreases

Oahu saw a decrease overall in this year’s Point-in-Time Count of homeless people, with the number of people in shelters dropping 24% and the number of those unsheltered increasing by 0.4% compared with the count in 2020.

The count also recorded a slight shift in the location of unsheltered homeless people from the Downtown/Kalihi/Nuuanu region to East Oahu.

Laura Thielen, executive director of Partners in Care, which organized the count, attributed the drop to decreased shelter space due to COVID-19 as well as government programs created during the pandemic to keep people in housing.

“We had some programs close throughout the year. We also had depopulation of many of the congregate shelters, due to COVID, and that’s continuing today. So there’s a lot less shelter beds that are available,” she said.

“We could have seen, I think, a much bigger uptick in the unsheltered numbers if we did not have some of the resources during COVID that we did.”

More than 300 volunteers dispersed across Oahu on the morning of March 10 to record the number of unsheltered homeless people for the annual Point-in-Time Count. They were instructed to ask where the homeless person had slept the night before.

The previous count was in January 2020, before the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown.

Compared with the 2020 count, the overall homeless population dropped 11%.

There were 3,951 homeless people counted on the night of March 9. Of that number, 60%, or 2,355, were sheltered, while the other 40%, or 1,596, were unsheltered.

Thielen said the state’s eviction moratorium, which lasted until August 2021, and the city’s Rent and Utility Relief program, which aimed to give about $225 million of federal funds to families in need, were significant factors in the numbers. Partners in Care also helped administer Oahu Housing Now, which helped house 800 homeless people using federal COVID-19 relief funds.

The count also showed where on the island the unsheltered homeless were located. The region that includes downtown, Kalihi and Nuuanu had the highest number with 26% of the homeless population, which was down from the recorded 32% in 2020. East Honolulu had the second-highest number with 24% of the counted homeless, which was an increase from the recorded 18% in 2020.

Thielen said Partners in Care would look more closely at the shift, but noted that it was at least partially attributed to the city efforts to decrease homelessness in the downtown/Chinatown area.

“Chinatown was significantly lower than in past years, significantly lower,” she said.

“We do think that there are some of those folks who have been arrested for various charges. So that that might be why they’re no longer in Chinatown, and the ‘Weed and Seed’ program. It’s not to say that that’s exactly why it’s happening. But I would be safe in saying that that’s definitely one of the factors.”

Weed and Seed is a city program that is targeting the Chinatown area, “weeding” out crime and “seeding” community initiatives.

City Council Chair Tommy Waters, who represents East Oahu, emphasized the need to put unsheltered homeless people into housing and to make sure people are not just being pushed to other parts of the island.

“The 6% shift from the downtown area to East Oahu is incredibly concerning,” he said.

“Weed and Seed needs to be more than a program that simply pushes folks from one community to another. We need to focus our attention on building places for people to live and ensure that we fund programs to address the root causes of homelessness.”

The mayor’s Office of Housing Executive Director Trish La Chica said in an emailed statement, “We note that the Point in Time Count offers only a snapshot of all those experiencing homelessness on a single night. With this limited data point, we cannot accurately determine a specific cause for the increase in unsheltered homeless in East Honolulu.”

She said she was encouraged by the decrease in the number of unsheltered in the Chinatown area, highlighting the work of Weed and Seed and the city’s Crisis Outreach Response and Engagement program, which uses special ambulances dedicated to addressing homeless-related nonemergencies.