KNOCK, KNOCK, ANYBODY HOME?
Last Thursday, Adylene Figueroa, a Mono County employee, noticed a light on in a van and mustered the courage to knock on the door to ask about the occupant’s housing status.
After spending five minutes building up her nerve, she found the woman inside was just a tourist passing through. Figueroa continued onto the Mono County public library in search of other individuals experiencing homelessness.
This is all part of her job.
She, along with other county employees and volunteers, executed the Point-in-Time Count (PIT) last week, a survey which aims to get a snapshot of the number of people experiencing homelessness in Mono, Alpine and Inyo counties, which are all under the Eastern Sierra Continuum of Care (CoC) designation.
The count happens every January, and the data is expected to be available by next week.
The Sheet met Figueroa when she arrived at the library. She was paired up with another Mono County employee, Sarah Eldridge.
In training, the survey takers are paired up and put into teams. If someone is surveying outside of Mammoth – Walker, Coleville, Benton, Chalfant, etc. – they’re also paired with a deputy sheriff or police officer.
Eldridge and Figueroa were tasked with surveying within the town of Mammoth Lakes at places like coffee shops and laundromats.
At the same time, some of their colleagues were surveying parking areas like the scenic loop and the lots at Canyon and Eagle lodges. Organizers in Inyo county held spaghetti dinners in Bishop and Lone Pine to try to bring people experiencing homelessness together.
This was Figueroa’s third year doing the PIT count, and in those years of experience, she’s found, to her surprise, bars are the best place to find people to survey.
“I usually go to the employee, because I don’t wanna go ask every person at the bar – that’s a little too much,” she said. “And they usually will be like, well, I know that person lives in their car.”
Despite this massive effort, it’s really hard to get a fully comprehensive count, and the PIT count has some flaws.
Last year, the Eastern Sierra Continuum of Care’s 2024 Point-In-Time Count found 71 individuals experiencing homelessness in Inyo County and 35 in Mono County. Of those, 65% were unsheltered, while 34% were sheltered or living in transitional housing.
But there were potentially many more people experiencing homelessness than that data reflects. The Sheet interviewed Anna Scott, Inyo County’s Human Services Director, in the January 11 issue (page 2) on why.
Scott said the definitions the PIT count uses don’t always include people staying temporarily with friends or family, which means a lot of people aren’t included in the data although they’re part of the population being surveyed.
Second, because the count is always done in January, It’s likely that the winter count of those experiencing homelessness is less than the area experiences in the summer months – especially in Mono and Alpine county. The PIT count is federally required to happen during this time, so the local CoC can’t change this factor.
Still, this year, the weather during the count was significantly warmer than previous years, which may change the outcome of the count, said Stephanie Rubio, Inyo County Housing Program Manager, in an interview Wednesday.
She also said – regardless of the year – some people are hesitant to give out their housing information because they’re anxious about the government using it against them.
People also might lie about their housing status because they’re embarrassed or ashamed, Eldridge told the Sheet. Figueroa added that doing the count at night also means people don’t get counted because their jobs overlap with the survey time – bartenders and servers, for example, are usually working Thursday nights.
Despite the PIT’s flaws, Rubio said the survey is ultimately a fair year-over-year comparison because it’s consistent in its methods, The last two years, the parameters on what constitutes as unsheltered with the federal definition of homelessness is the same as what they surveyed on last year, which prevents inflated numbers based on definition changes.
The data is categorized by demographics like age and living situation; there are different surveys for different types of people: the survey form is different for a minor than an adult, and there are different questions for people who receive a hotel room or some type of shelter.
“We just kind of determine, based on the interview, what their needs are and what led to them experiencing homelessness and how long it’s happened,” Rubio said.
The CoC incentivizes people to take the survey by handing out backpacks, like goodie bags, to people who do fill it out, Figueroa said. The backpacks have things like a blanket, socks and a grocery outlet gift card in them.
If people don’t want to do the survey or the surveyors don’t feel comfortable surveying someone, the surveyor can fill out an “observation” form on the person instead, Rubio said.
The data determines the CoC’s future programming and the federal government uses the data to determine how much funding the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development can allocate to certain areas.
