HELENA – The 2018Montana Homeless Point in Time data is now available to the public.
The Montana Point in Time Survey is part of a national coordinated effort to identify the number of persons who are homeless on a single night and was conducted on January 25 in 2018.
Locally, the survey is administered by local providers of homeless services and volunteers in partnership with the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
On the night of January 25th, 2,060 people across Montana filled out the Point in Time Survey and 1,052 individuals reported themselves as being homeless.
In Helena, 96 individuals reported being un-sheltered or in emergency or transitional housings.
The majority of those that took the survey in the Capitol City identified as male with only around 1/3 identifying as female.
9 people in Helena said they were the parent of a child and 16 people were children under the age of eighteen.
Trina Filan, Director of Community Impact with United Way of the Lewis & Clark Area, said the survey is a helpful tool but it doesn’t give a full picture of homelessness in the community on it’s own.
Filan believes the fault with the survey is in it only being collected on one night each year, while homelessness can happen very abruptly from an event like losing a job or a mental health crisis.
“You can slip into homelessness quite unexpectedly,” said Filan, “I think that’s a really hard thing for folks to think about, that one thing can push a family or individual out of stability and into crisis.”
The survey is also only representative of those who were able to to be contacted during the survey and chose to participate.
“Some folks just don’t trust or want to answer the survey so they’re not going to be included,” said Filan. “Montana is also a rural and frontier state, so there are some folks that live in places that aren’t going to be accessible.”
Addressing homelessness in the area is not an easy or simple task though.
The United Way believes greatest needs are to improve communication with those experiencing homelessness, have better and safe housing options for people and have a greater ability to help those in mental health crisis.
“It’s rare to find someone who wants to live on the street,” said Filan. “Once you’re in crisis getting back into stability isn’t easy.
That doesn’t mean nothing is being done to combat homelessness in the community.
Filan said there are countless social services workers and volunteers in the area dedicated to helping people in a crisis situation, and the United Way has the Greater Helena Area Housing First program. https://unitedwaylca.org/what-we-do/gha-housing-first/
“Most importantly we have to remember that homelessness is a crisis situation that affects real people, families and children who are in need of help,” added Filan.
