Becky Kanis, director of innovations at the New York-based nonprofit Common Ground, knows a lot about counting homeless people.

Her organization has worked in New Orleans, Times Square, and Los Angeles, canvassing homeless people on the street in the morning’s wee hours, conducting interviews and placing the most vulnerable among them into permanent supportive homes.

Last week, Common Ground turned its reckoning powers and methodology on the District, with city officials, service providers and trained volunteers administrating surveys to those on the street and 500 of the longest-dwelling shelter residents, according to Laura Zeilinger, deputy director of the Department of Human Services.

“The difference in D.C. is that it’s the whole city,” Kanis said. Never before has the survey been conducted in shelters or on a citywide scale. And with the city pledging permanent supporting units to the 400 most vulnerable participants, stakes are high.

“The biggest challenge is really making sure the most vulnerable get captured,” Kanis said.

Vulnerability, as defined by Kanis’s organization, is determined by a list of factors, which, combined, increase a homeless person’s likelihood of dying.

Those with end-stage renal disease, HIV/AIDS, liver disease or cirrhosis are particularly vulnerable, as are those with high incidences of emergency room visits and hospitalizations or those with a triumvirate of mental illness, substance abuse and chronic medical problems. Being over 60 years old also indicates high vulnerability to death on the street.

Street homelessness generates a very high mortality rate, Kanis said. Research on mortality in shelters is not available, she added.

Typically, Common Ground has found one or two individuals with six or more of the eight indicators, a handful with four to five and a majority with three. A few of those with one to two indicators might make the housing cutoff, in which case priority goes to individuals who have been homeless the longest, Kanis said.

“People on the street – they get it,” she said. “They know who is sicker than them.”

Pierre Moye, head of homeless outreach at New York Avenue Presbyterian Church and a volunteer assessor, believes many of those 400 who do make it into housing will come from the street homeless population, although Zeilinger could not comment until the surveys are calculated.

A June 5 informal survey of the street population found 422 people, Zeilinger said at an Interagency Council on Homelessness meeting. The survey, however, was conducted a little after 9 p.m., Moye said, much before many of the city’s street population settles down for the night. He predicted the numbers would be higher when the surveys were conducted from 4:30 a.m. to 7 a.m.

Assessors went out June 16, 17 and 18, with each team assigned to the same spot every morning. This ensured most people were counted, even if they were not there one day, Kanis said. It also offered the assessors a chance to build relationships, Zeilinger said.

Since the surveys will be conducted early in the morning, many people will be likely be sleeping, said Zeilinger at the June 12 Interagency Council meeting. If a person is too disoriented to answer the survey the first day, the teams will leave a short paper explaining the survey and noting that they will be back tomorrow, she said.

John McDermott, a homeless advocate, disapproved of the city’s survey tactics. The 4:30 a.m. wake-ups were unnecessary, he said. It would be better to survey those at lunch programs or other day centers, Mc- Dermott said.

While conducting the surveys in the early morning might not be ideal, the city’s timing was essential to capturing people who may be on the move during the day, said city administrator Dan Tangherlini.

Jana Meyer, the minister of missions at Foundry United Methodist Church and a volunteer assessor, agreed, adding that their training offered tips on waking people up. Meyer is enthusiastic about the commitment to housing, but emphasized a continued need for accountability from service providers and the city.

“We’re clearly not going to get everyone,” she said. “It’s a work in progress.”

The United Planning Organization, the group tasked with finding people sleeping outside during hypothermia season, has added its knowledge to the search and additional outreach teams conducted assessments in outlying areas of the city, Zeilinger said. Service providers that provide food and medical services have been encouraged to draft lists of their most vulnerable clients as well, she said. Those lists will be crosschecked with the city’s assessments to identify people who were missed.

The city’s willingness to embrace a change on this issue marks a promising deviation from the previous stance of the Williams administration, said Moye.

That dedication, among both the volunteer assessors and city officials, will go a long way in making this process a success, Kanis said. Commitment is necessary to thoroughly canvass and later, to identify and relocate the 400 people deemed most vulnerable.

The teams will take photographs, and several questions on the survey help pinpoint participants, such as where they spend their days and next of kin, Kanis said. Finding people again has not been a problem for Common Ground in the past, she said.

Once the 400 are found, housing and supportive services can be arranged quickly. In Los Angeles, it took the city an average of 14 days from when they found people to when they moved them into housing, Kanis said. In the District, the city is planning to move the 400 residents into housing by Oct. 1, Zeilinger said. Supportive services will likely start before the move-in.

Inevitably, more will be surveyed than can be housed. Only 400 spots are available this year, not even enough for all of the city’s street population let alone the 500 shelter residents who have dwelled in the system the longest. Such is nature of the process, Kanis said.

The Department of Human Services is devising a system to track those homeless individuals surveyed this year, Zeilinger said, which will help to place individuals in another 400 single units and 80 family units next fiscal year.

“It’s unfortunate that there is not enough for everybody immediately,” Kanis said. But, she added, noting the first-come, first-served mentality of the current system, at least this gives “some method to the madness.”

June 25, 2008