Advocacy Group Says Denver’s Pandemic-Era Rehousing Program Didn’t Reduce Homelessness as Much as the City Claims
An advocacy group in Denver and the city’s mayor are in a spat over whether Denver’s pandemic-era rapid rehousing program was as successful as officials claim. The disagreement points to the issues wrought by relying on data from the annual Point in Time Count to measure progress on initiatives targeting homelessness.
Housekeys Action Network Denver (HAND) has been advocating for people who are homeless since the group launched in 2022. That same year, Denver ramped up its House 1000 program, a rapid rehousing program that was designed to provide temporary shelter and connect program participants with permanent housing.
The House 1000 program was funded by federal American Rescue Plan Act money distributed by former President Joe Biden’s administration. Denver spent more than $150 million to acquire old hotels, convert them into temporary shelter, and sign contracts with local service providers like The Salvation Army and The United Way. The first sites didn’t open until 2023.
In all, the city’s data shows it served more than 7,700 people in the more than three years since House 1000 launched. The city also claims to have moved about 6,500 people into housing and reduced unsheltered homelessness by 45%, according to estimates from the Point in Time Count (PIT). That was before the program began to wind down earlier this year as federal American Rescue Plan funds expired.
HAND claims there is a “significant problem” with the city’s data. For instance, the group pointed out that the city appears to be adding people who stayed in emergency cold weather shelters with people who were otherwise sheltered or housed during the House 1000 program.
“These people are otherwise unsheltered, staying on the streets,” the advocacy group claimed. “They should be counted as unsheltered, not sheltered.”
According to HAND’s math, unsheltered homelessness in Denver increased during the House 1000 program, from 1,273 people in 2023 to 1,351 in 2024.
Denver’s Department of Housing Stability pushed back against HAND’s claim, arguing that there were “nearly twice as many people counted as being on the streets during [the 2023] count” even though cold weather shelters were open.
Regardless of the numbers, the disagreement between HAND and Denver officials illustrates the follies of relying on inaccurate survey data from PIT to measure the impact of homelessness programs.
Why PIT Data Is Inaccurate
The PIT count has been the standard bearer of homelessness data since the Department of Housing and Urban Development created the survey in 2007. Since then, data collected during the survey has been the primary way for elected officials and service providers to measure the impact of their efforts.
However, there are several problems with PIT. For example, the survey relies on volunteers to physically count people experiencing homelessness in emergency shelters, transitional housing, and encampments. Volunteers are dispatched in late January, one of the coldest times of the year, which inevitably skews the snapshot of homelessness they collect.
The survey also doesn’t provide a real-time analysis of changes in homeless demographics and other trends, which can make it difficult for officials and service providers to adequately help those in need.
“It’s not a HUD requirement or a federal government requirement for communities to be reporting on and collecting data about how many people are experiencing homelessness on a real-time basis,” Adam Ruege, director of strategy and evaluation at Community Solutions, told Invisible People.
The Benefits of Real-Time Data
Several cities have realized the pitfalls of relying on PIT data and have begun utilizing real-time data to address homelessness. The most striking aspect of this trend is how different the picture of homelessness becomes when real-time data is involved.
There are organizations like Community Solutions that advocate for cities to use what are called “by name lists,” or datasets that provide more nuanced data about the people who are homeless locally.
Other nonprofits are using data from the Homeless Management Information System to measure the scope of homelessness locally. HMIS data differs from the PIT count in that it shows how many people are accessing homeless services, whereas the PIT count only measures who is living in emergency shelter, transitional housing, or encampments.
Using HMIS data to measure the scope of homelessness has proven to be eye-opening. For instance, the Metro Denver Homeless Initiative, a local Continuum of Care, released a report earlier this year showing that more than 30,000 people are accessing homeless services. That’s compared to the nearly 10,000 people counted using the PIT method.
HMIS data can also show the periodic fluctuations in homelessness, which PIT cannot. For example, HMIS data can show how frequently certain individuals access services, which can be used to measure the effectiveness of different interventions.
“One of our big efforts is to help communities redesign their data systems and outreach systems so that they can pinpoint how many people are experiencing homelessness,” Reuge said. “We’ve been doing this for 10 years. Over 140 communities are working with us across the US.”
“So, we know that communities can figure out who’s experiencing homelessness at any given time,” he continued. “It’s entirely possible and not even a matter of crafting a completely new approach. Rather, it is possible by tweaking and reconfiguring the old systems, updating them, if you will.”
How You Can Help
Now is not the time to be silent about homelessness in America. Poverty and homelessness are both policy choices, not personal failures. That’s why we need you to contact your officials and tell them you support legislation that:
- Streamlines the development of affordable housing
- Reduces barriers for people experiencing homelessness to enter permanent housing
- Bolsters government response to homelessness
Together, we can end homelessness.