Hidden in Plain Sight: An Assessment of Youth Inclusion in Point-in-Time Counts of California’s Unsheltered Homeless Population

Homeless youth are a hidden population that has historically been undercounted in local, state, and federal efforts to enumerate the homeless population. In recent years, researchers and advocates have emphasized the importance of considering the needs of homeless youth as a distinct sub-population of the homeless population overall. A clear recognition has emerged that improvements to the wellbeing of homeless youth in the US must be informed by accurate data regarding the prevalence and composition of the homeless youth population. In 2013, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which mandates communities receiving federal funds for homelessness programming to conduct a biennial Point-in-Time (PIT) count of their unsheltered homeless populations, required for the first time that communities report the number of unsheltered, unaccompanied minors and 18 to 24-year-old youth (known as transition age youth, or TAY). Prior to this, CoCs had been required to report the numbers of unaccompanied minors but had not been required to record or report numbers of TAY separately from their adult homeless population. Communities have had a range of responses to this new directive, from changing little about their practices to establishing separate youth-specific count initiatives.

Publication Date: 
2013