By BENNETT HALL
For the Democrat-Herald | Posted: Thursday, September 18, 2008 12:00 am
Paid census takers tally nearly 200 people
living without permanent addresses
CORVALLIS - Ten local homeless people fanned out around Corvallis last weekend to conduct the first-ever "street count" of the city's homeless population.
Armed with clipboards and survey forms, pairs of census-takers checked in on homeless camps, soup kitchens, bottle-return centers and other places where people without a permanent street address tend to congregate.
The tally: 130 people with no fixed address are living in and around Corvallis. A separate check of local homeless shelters found 68 people living there, bringing the city's total homeless population to 198.
Local advocates for the homeless have been conducting an annual count of shelter populations for several years as part of a national, community-based "10-year plan to end homelessness" campaign. The last count, conducted in January, found 160 homeless people in Benton County.
Last weekend's sweep was the first attempt to tally people camping out, sleeping on the streets or otherwise living off the social grid.
As always when it comes to counting the homeless, the numbers are almost certainly low. While a few people in shelters may have been double-counted, the survey likely missed some folks living in their cars or "couch-surfing" at the homes of friends and relatives. Others might have been in jail or addiction treatment facilities when the count was done.
Benton County appropriated $1,500 to do the survey. Most of the money went to the census-takers, who were paid $11 an hour for their time. Because the survey teams were made up of local homeless people, they generally got a friendly reception.
"We felt they would have better rapport and trust," said Aleita Hass-Holcombe of the Corvallis Homeless Shelter Coalition, which organized the survey.
The teams did not take names or record the locations of camps, which helped ease fears that homeless campers might be rousted from their outdoor homes. For the most part, Hass-Holcombe said, people were willing to answer a series of nine questions about their living situations, employment status, military history, access to services and history of homelessness.
The vast majority of campers - 114 out of 130 - were men. No children were found camping out (although there are currently 28 minors housed in Corvallis shelters).
Volunteers are analyzing the survey data and compiling a report for the steering committee working on a 10-year plan to reduce homelessness in Benton County.