Trying to Count the Down-and-Out

Twelve hours of steady rain had turned the Boyle Heights intersection of 8th and Soto into a sloppy, grimy soup.

It was rush hour, and most drivers didn’t even notice the other steady traffic on foot: the homeless crossing from corner to corner, hustling for change or rock cocaine or stepping into a fast-food joint.

But a homeless outreach worker named Amanda Sosa, who used to live on these streets, saw them Thursday night and offered a sandwich, maybe a personal hygiene kit and a pitch: Could you answer some questions on this survey?

The answers she got will help U.S. census officials count the many hidden homeless, who have traditionally eluded enumerators because they don’t show up in shelters or soup kitchens.

From 5 p.m. to midnight Thursday, teams of outreach workers hit five census tracts in different parts of Los Angeles, scrambling along freeway embankments, poking flashlights under bushes and scanning alleys and parks.

The one-night count--timed to simulate next March’s national census--was designed by homeless advocates and Los Angeles city officials to prevent a repeat of the 1990 census, where many street people were undercounted.

Thursday’s survey evolved out of the enormous concern about the 1990 undercount of the homeless, said Jan Perry, executive director for the city’s Census 2000 Outreach project. At stake, she said, is the level of federal funding that is based on the government’s count of the homeless, including dollars for social services groups and city departments that provide health, housing and food services to the poor.

The 1990 census tallied 7,706 homeless people in Los Angeles, but several advocacy groups thought the totals should have been two to four times greater.

A 1991 report compiled by the Shelter Partnership, a support organization for shelters and homeless programs, estimated that at least 36,800 and possibly as many as 59,100 people were homeless each night in Los Angeles County. More than half were in the city of Los Angeles, the study found.

Thursday’s count--the preliminary results of which won’t be available until next week--tried to determine the permanence of various encampments, said Dave Ely, a demographic research consultant for the city.

In Van Nuys, Melle Atayde, an L.A. Family Housing Corp. shelter worker who helped with the count, said some street people were wary, because the project seemed vaguely connected to the government.

Several encampments were found in Van Nuys, she said. But most were smaller sites of just one person.

Back in Boyle Heights, meanwhile, 50 feet above the noisy din of the Golden State Freeway, Larry, 44, and his partner, Mary, 43, shared a tidy home fashioned from a tarp that protects their mattress, a tiny black-and-white TV, and shelves of pots, pans and clothes.

They had been on the streets 13 years, Mary said, sometimes staying in locations for years at a time.

Skeptics of the homeless count maintain that the census was never designed to identify street people.

“It’s suicidal to do an outdoor count,” said Martha Burt, program director for the social services research program at the Urban Institute in Washington. “What you are going to find in one night is not going to be everybody by a longshot.”

The Census Bureau’s Bettye Moohn, chief of the field programs branch, said the Census Bureau has already revamped how it will count encampments. During last year’s dress rehearsal, only sites of 15 or more people were noted. In 2000, census officials said, all will be tallied regardless of size.

Sosa’s travels Thursday night took her to one such site in Hollenbeck Park, where two men and a woman politely answered the survey, while a fourth person remained huddled under blankets, not stirring.

Under a roofed concrete deck overlooking the lake, Sosa, a 44-year-old East L.A. native who once lived on these same streets, spoke with one Latino man, perhaps in his early 50s. His neat appearance--unwrinkled slacks, leather jacket and clean blue shirt--gave no hint that he was out on the streets.

“He needs a referral,” Sosa said to a co-worker after finishing the survey. Perhaps this man might be open to going to a shelter or accepting other services, she thought.

With its lake in the background and illuminated fountains, the setting seemed peaceful and quiet.

To keep it that way, Mike Garcia, an AIDS outreach supervisor for the service organization Bienestar, had done some advance work.

A few minutes ahead of the team, Garcia had stopped by a local gang member’s house to give them a heads-up that volunteers, not rival gang members, would be walking through the park.

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Homeless Counted for Census

Five city census tracts were selected by homeless assistance groups and the city of Los Angeles for Thursday night’s count. The tracts were in Van Nuys, Boyle Heights, Pico-Union, Venice and Watts. Teams of shelter workers searched through streets and alleys, parks under bridges and along freeways from 5 p.m. to midnight to survey the homeless. After the results are compiled, a report will be sent to the Census Bureau to possibly change its methodology for counting the homeless in next year’s Census 2000.