Volunteers Brave The Cold To Take Dallas County Homeless Count

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DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - Volunteers for the Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance (MDHA) were out all of Thursday night, talking to people who are living on the streets. The volunteers worked in teams, with police providing some security, to take an unofficial census of the homeless population in Dallas and Collin Counties.

MDHA Executive Director Cindy Crain says volunteers found some 600 homeless people in the city of Dallas. "There were a lot of people living in cars," she said.

According to Crain, in addition to living in vehicles, a lot of North Texas homeless live in tents. "Under the I-45 Bridge, which is the largest encampment, there's usually somewhere around 200 folks there. Last night we found 184."

The purpose of the count is to help local communities and the nation as a whole, identify and understand the extent and nature of homelessness, change trends in the area, and measure what success, if any, has been made toward ending homelessness.

Workers say the count is about more than just getting numbers -- volunteers engaged with the people they came across and also asked them questions about how they got to where they are.

"It really gives us an idea of the nature and extent of homelessness on the street and move it from this anecdote that we think that there's more homeless, but to truly get a better census," Crain explained. "It's important because we actually report this information to the federal government as part of our Continuing of Care Grant."

The government requires that the count of unsheltered and sheltered homeless take place on a night that falls within the last 10 days of January.

In addition to getting homeless numbers from Garland and Mesquite, Crain said, "I will hear from Irving, Plano, all through Collin County, Mesquite and Garland, they will be submitting their results today," Crain explained. "And then on March 22 is when I will do a formal presentation of the State of the Homeless Address."

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