(via Social Good, Social Media, Social Life: My Passion for Homelessness, Then and Now)
“The most recent project was last week, when I volunteered for the annual Santa Monica Homeless Count. Every other year, federal mandate requires cities to conduct an actual count of the number of individuals that do not have permanent housing. According to this report, over 50,000 individuals live on the streets in Los Angeles County — and unfortunately, that’s the largest number in the country. In Santa Monica, the number of homeless individuals remained the same in 2011, but dropped nearly 20% since 2009. The city hopes that in 2012, the count will show better results. This was different than any service project I had done before since it did not deal with raising awareness or providing immediate relief. By counting the number of individuals seen living on the streets of Santa Monica, we were helping the city proactively gauge the severity of the problem, identify areas of the city that the homeless population is growing and trends of movement that can help the city allocate its resources.”
