Enumerators Counting on Outreach to the Homeless

Census takers in Southern California are training this weekend for one of the most controversial tasks in the decennial survey: counting the homeless.

The workers, wearing bright orange and yellow vests to make them appear less threatening, will fan out to shelters Monday evening, soup kitchens the following day and to underpasses, encampments and other makeshift dwellings Tuesday night. The vest colors, similar to what safety workers wear, were recommended by homeless advocates who saw the black and white version worn during the 1990 census as too ominous, said Steve Alnwick, assistant director at the regional census headquarters in Van Nuys.

“This time we’ve made sure we have enough employees who speak Spanish,” added Vincent Galvez, the Ventura County census office manager.

Shelter workers and the Census Bureau have tried to get the word out to the homeless to fill out the forms, and in some cases those efforts appear to have paid off.

“I live here, I know they need the money. They operate off federal money,” said Terry Cook, 43, standing outside the San Fernando Valley Access Center, a shelter on Lankershim Boulevard in North Hollywood.

“There are places like this, but not enough,” Cook said. “Some people may not fill out the forms because they don’t think it’s important. . . . I think everyone should fill it out honestly.”

But many homeless advocates locally and nationally said they don’t expect this year’s count to be much better than the highly controversial one in 1990. That census, which reported 228,621 homeless people nationwide with the largest number living in California, was blasted by congressional investigators in the General Accounting Office as grossly inaccurate.

For example, 7,706 homeless people were counted in the city of Los Angeles at shelters or on the streets, compared with homeless organization estimates of two to four times as many. In Ventura County, 504 were counted, although the county’s chief administrator complained the number was anywhere from four to eight times as high.

With the Census Bureau next week limiting its surveying to one day each at a specific type of homeless or transient location, there’s little chance of most, let alone everyone, being surveyed, the advocates said.

“The most important thing to understand is that it’s not a [total] count,” said Mary Ann Gleason, executive director for the National Coalition for the Homeless in Washington, D.C. “They are only going to some shelters, some soup kitchens, some outdoor locations.”

The Census Bureau’s Alnwick agreed. “It’s not a total picture, that’s correct,” he said. But the manner in which they count the homeless and transient populations ensures they at least get a snapshot, he said.

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Ruth Schwartz of the nonprofit Shelter Partnership in downtown Los Angeles, which tallies homeless numbers, said she hopes future federal grants won’t rely on census figures. “We know we can’t do a full count on the homeless. Street counts are notoriously bad,” she said.

Ted Landreth, who heads the Greater West Hollywood Food Coalition, agreed.. “The transient population is by definition, transient. To come one night doesn’t do the job--they should come three or four nights,” he said.

In 1990, the 100 or so people his organization feeds daily never saw a census employee, even after they called the local office about it, he said.

Reopening the city’s winter shelters for Monday’s one-day survey will also likely miss a lot of homeless people because many believe the shelters to be closed for the season, said Jeffrey Farber, chief executive officer of L.A. Family Housing Corp., which operates the Valley Access center, other shelters, transitional housing and long-term apartment programs throughout the county.

One winter shelter is at the armory in Sylmar, and Farber said during rainy or cold weather, up to 125 people bunk there. Unless it rains this weekend, and the armory is reopened, it’s not known how many people will turn up at the facility for the census takers.

A better way to tally those “hidden homeless,” Farber said, would be to use agency advocates like his group, who over a period of several nights would comb the dark alleys, foothill encampments and hidden tents on freeway embankments to count people.

Many of those “hidden homeless” shy away from shelters and may not want to be counted, said Maryza Gutierrez, a caseworker at the Valley Access Center. “They are in a crisis situation, they have families,” she said. “Their situation takes precedence over the census.”

Nonetheless, Farber said his organization was ready for the census takers.

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On Monday, Farber said his staff will greet enumerators with lists of all residents, which will allow for them to follow up if the occupant is not present.

Nearly a third of L.A. Family Housing Corp.’s $5.3-million budget is federal money, he added.

One client at the Lankershim shelter, Alfred Gagne, 59, said Friday he didn’t know that federal money helped run the shelter. He said he last filled out a form 30 years ago in Massachusetts, but will be around Monday to take part in the census.

So will Beverley Lorimer, 58, who said that she is aware of the importance of the forms. She has occasionally stayed at the shelter while dealing with the double blows of a debilitating nerve disease and the loss of a job.

Lorimer said she worked for 38 years as a senior auditor at an insurance agency. She had a car, a home, a comfortable life. But all of that is gone, and she now relies on a cane, walking slowly and painfully.

With adequate funding, the homeless can get more food programs and shelters, she said.

“It will help establish the need for other shelters and nonshelter programs where you can get food,” she said.

Lorimer has relied on some nonshelter programs for meals, “but you only get food once a month or a week,” she said. “And what they gave, it won’t last a week or a month.”

Times staff writers Matthew Ebnet and Matt Surman contributed to this report.