{"id":6065,"date":"2016-12-01T20:24:02","date_gmt":"2016-12-01T20:24:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=6065"},"modified":"2016-12-16T20:24:58","modified_gmt":"2016-12-16T20:24:58","slug":"survey-texas-reduces-homelessness-by-42-percent-since-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=6065","title":{"rendered":"Survey: Texas Reduces Homelessness by 42 Percent Since 2007"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A<\/a>

A federal survey shows that Texas has reduced the number of homeless people needing shelter by 42 percent since 2007. Photo: bodnarchuk\/iStockphoto<\/p><\/div>\n

by Mark Richardson<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

AUSTIN, Texas<\/strong> \u2013 Advocates for Texas\u2019 homeless population are celebrating a federal report showing a significant reduction in the number of Texans who are homeless over the past decade.<\/p>\n

According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development\u2019s annual count<\/a>, homelessness in Texas dropped by almost 42 percent from 2007 to 2016 \u2013 a period when the state\u2019s overall population grew 13 percent. Eric Samuels, executive director at the Texas Homeless Network, said the progress is due to better funding and support, as well as new methods for housing the homeless.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s either permanent support housing or rapid re-housing, right away. They\u2019re not moving people through emergency shelter and transitional housing programs,\u201d Samuels said. \u201cBecause they\u2019re doing that and because they\u2019re directing their funding towards those programs, we\u2019re getting people out of homelessness faster.\u201d<\/p>\n

The HUD survey measured the number of people on the streets in a single 24-hour period in most American towns and cities. Samuels\u2019 network helped conduct the annual point-in-time survey in Texas. The group also provides training to agencies tackling homelessness.<\/p>\n

Texas had some advantages in the survey, Samuels said, including lower housing costs and a somewhat better job market than in many states. But he said that helping groups like the chronically homeless and veterans remains a challenge.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be chronically homeless, you have to be on the street for a long duration of time or have frequent episodes of homelessness and have a disabling condition,\u201d Samuels explained. \u201cOne of the disabling conditions often is a mental illness. The news there is good because we are getting a lot of those folks off the street.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said another major factor in the state\u2019s performance was that the federal government has increased funding for homeless programs in Texas by 70 percent since 2005.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we just need to keep up the effort from our local communities and in our governmental officials in regard to this emphasis on ending homelessness for all groups,\u201d Samuels said; \u201cespecially lately with the veterans and chronically homeless.\u201d<\/p>\n

Having 23,000 people still living on Texas streets is not an acceptable situation, he said. But advocates are proud of what the state has accomplished over the past decade.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Mark Richardson AUSTIN, Texas \u2013 Advocates for Texas\u2019 homeless population are celebrating a federal report showing a significant reduction in the number of Texans who are homeless over the past decade. According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development\u2019s annual count, homelessness in Texas dropped by almost 42 percent from 2007 to 2016 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6066,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6065"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6065\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6067,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6065\/revisions\/6067"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}