Multnomah County's Homeless Services Department said it will revise its by-name list so that about 3,500 fewer people are counted as currently homeless, lowering the May figure of 18,000 by nearly 20%. Deputy director Anna Plumb called it "a data clean-up" that does not mean those people were housed; the largest change shortens the inactivity window before someone drops off the list from 90–180 days to 60–90 days, on the advice of the consultant Community Solutions. The county said the new method will be applied retroactively to January 2024 and take effect in the next month or so.
The by-name list launched in April 2025; program manager Lori Kelley said the shorter inactivity window accounts for most of the reduction.
Los Angeles County officials announced Tuesday the county will apply to HUD to take over four federal functions LAHSA relinquished — the annual point-in-time count, the annual federal funding application, the Homeless Management Information System, and the Coordinated Entry System — while the city of Los Angeles is seeking only the HMIS and CES functions. The move follows LAHSA's September 16 vote not to continue as lead agency for the Los Angeles Continuum of Care, which covers 85 cities plus unincorporated county. County counsel said any departure from the LAHSA joint-powers authority would require 180 days' notice; about $241 million already earmarked for the region by Congress is at stake.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week overruled U.S. District Judge David Carter's partial preliminary injunction that had allowed LAHSA access to federal homelessness funding for fiscal year 2026.
San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan announced city data showing the unsheltered population fell 32% over 18 months, from about 5,400 people in February 2025 to about 3,700 in August 2026, measured by a new model that uses 15 data points and can be run at least quarterly. Mahan attributed the decline to encampment cleanups, no-re-encampment zones and emergency housing alternatives; an advocate quoted in the story questioned the claims.
The city's model estimated 1,500 more unsheltered individuals than the county's point-in-time count.
Marin County's 2026 point-in-time count found 438 chronically homeless people, up from 217 in 2024, with 83 percent of them unsheltered. Overall homelessness rose from 1,090 people in 2024 to 1,128, while veteran homelessness fell from 49 to 11 and youth homelessness fell from 108 to 60. More than 150 chronically homeless people in the county have been accepted for federal Section 8 assistance but are still waiting for vouchers.
LAist · on UCLA/USC research on unsheltered residents near 2028 Olympic venues
Researchers from UCLA and USC published an estimate of 5,975 unsheltered people living within one mile of Olympic and Paralympic venues in Los Angeles County, more than three times the roughly 1,600 the L.A. County Department of Housing and Homelessness had estimated could be affected by security perimeters. The researchers put about 2,200 unhoused people within a half mile of venues and published the findings on a website called Home 2028. Officials have said security perimeters will require unhoused people to leave Olympic zones but have not detailed plans for where they would go.
The 2026 point-in-time count recorded around 49,000 unsheltered people countywide.
A Chronicle records analysis found the number of people whom official documents indicate had been homeless before they were found dead in Houston's bayous has risen in recent years, with total bayou deaths surpassing 30 a year for the first time in 2024 and 2025. The increase came as the region's annual unsheltered count dropped to its lowest point since Hurricane Harvey, under 1,300 every year since 2023. Ben King, founding director of the University of Houston's Institute for Housing, Homelessness and Health, has documented the trend in an annual homeless mortality report.
A prior Chronicle analysis tallied 201 deaths along Harris County bayous in medical examiner records from 2017 through late November 2025; the unsheltered count covers Harris, Montgomery and Fort Bend counties.
The 2026 homeless count recorded 671 RVs in the 400 square miles of unincorporated Antelope Valley desert, down from 1,432 the year before, a drop that accounted for three-fourths of a 21% countywide decrease in RVs. Pearblossom Town Council president Christopher Minsal, who led the local canvass teams, and council member Jose Centeno said the numbers are wrong and that RV arrivals have not slowed; tract-level tallies in Littlerock/Pearblossom swung from 4 to 349 to 253 over three years. LAHSA did not dispute the miscount assessment and defended its method for counting the area in a statement.
The L.A. City Council on August 26 called for a review of the 2026 point-in-time count, which showed a 1.2% countywide increase in homelessness.
A Public Policy Institute of California study estimated that Proposition 47, the 2014 ballot measure reclassifying certain drug and property felonies as misdemeanors, led to about a 10% increase in street homelessness between 2015 and 2019 — roughly 7,000 additional unsheltered Californians, about 20% of the state's overall unsheltered increase in that period. The researchers, led by Magnus Lofstrom, also found the measure increased drug use as measured by overdose deaths and hospitalizations by 7% to 8% and reduced the number of Californians receiving drug treatment by 20%, because courts referred fewer people into treatment programs.
California voters partially rolled back Proposition 47 in November 2024 by passing Proposition 36, which restored felony charges for some repeat drug and theft offenses.
Westside Current · on a UCLA study of student homelessness in Los Angeles County schools
UCLA researchers found L.A. County schools saw a 30% increase in student homelessness between the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years, with an estimated 61,249 K-12 students experiencing homelessness in 2023-24. A separate statewide UCLA report counted 298,254 California students experiencing homelessness in 2024-25, a 10% increase from 2018-19.
California has approved a one-time $116 million allocation to help schools identify students experiencing homelessness.
The Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously August 26 to request a review of LAHSA's 2026 point-in-time homeless count, citing accuracy concerns. The count showed homelessness in District 8 increased 128% from 2025 to 2026, and in one census tract covering the West Park Terrace neighborhood the number of unhoused people observed went from fewer than 20 in recent years to 277 in 2026.
The Los Angeles Times reported August 11 that an accounting error caused nearly half of the increase in the city's 2026 homeless count.
CalMatters compiled preliminary results from January 2026 point-in-time counts and reported that of the 28 counties or continuums of care releasing data, more than half showed declines — San Joaquin County down nearly a third from 2024, Alameda County down 13%, San Francisco down 4% — while Los Angeles County reported a 1% increase and Sacramento County a 13% increase. Officials credited state-funded shelter beds and housing, while advocates said stepped-up encampment enforcement scatters people and makes them harder to count. A RAND study of Skid Row, Hollywood, and Venice found unsheltered homelessness unchanged from December 2024 to January 2026, with tent-dwelling down 23% and rough sleeping up 20%.
HUD's official 2025 count was 181,934 homeless Californians, a nearly 3% drop from 2024; the official statewide 2026 compilation is months away.
Metro Nashville Office of Homeless Services · on Nashville's certified 2026 point-in-time count results
Nashville's Office of Homeless Services released certified 2026 point-in-time count results identifying 2,298 people experiencing literal homelessness on the night of January 22, 655 of them unsheltered — an increase of 118 people, or 5.4%, from 2025. The office reported Nashville's 2022–2025 increase of 13.8% against a 28% national increase and a 36.1% average among its selected comparison communities.
Nashville police made arrests under Tennessee's felony camping law earlier this month, per August 13 reporting.
HUD's January 2025 point-in-time count recorded 32,495 veterans experiencing homelessness, 387 (1.2%) fewer than the previous year, with 25 states recording increases and 23 recording decreases. Oregon had the largest raw increase at 228 added veterans (16%), and California the largest decline, down 624 to 8,686. Community Solutions attributed the long-term decline to sustained federal housing and mental health investments dating to 2009.
Since 2010, veteran homelessness has fallen more than 56%; results from the January 2026 count have not been released.
Next City reported that Cleveland, Indianapolis, and Tulsa have adopted local versions of Clutch Consulting's Direct-to-Housing encampment model. Tulsa's unsheltered count fell 31% between 2025 and 2026, from 496 people to 339; Indianapolis's program has housed 220 people since June 2025; and Cleveland's has housed more than 200 since 2024, prompting its council to add $1.9 million to extend the program two years. Clutch reported that across nine adopting cities, roughly 85% of people engaged do not return to homelessness within a year.
Tulsa's unsheltered population nearly doubled between 2021 and 2024, to 534 people.
The Times reported that Skid Row shelter beds at the Union Rescue Mission — counted in some years and omitted in others because the shelter does not use LAHSA's data system — accounted for most of a reported 614-person rise in Skid Row's sheltered population, inflating the city's 2026 count increase. The paper's calculation put the citywide increase at just under 1.9% rather than the reported 3.4%. Mayor Bass said LAHSA did not tell her office about the discrepancies before release; LAHSA said singling out one factor "can be inaccurate and misleading."
LAHSA reported the city's 2026 count as 45,194 people, a 3.4% increase, on July 23.