As residents throughout King County slept Jan. 25, volunteers walked the dark city streets looking for and counting those who were surviving without shelter.
While searching in the South Aurora region between 165th and 147th Streets, Seattle resident and team leader Matt Houghton shined a flashlight through bushes, onto loading docks and across the backs of dark buildings and parking lots.
“They tend to be where there are services during the day and in Shoreline there are that many places like that for them,” he told another volunteer.
In less than two hours his team of five covered blocks of pavement but returned with only a few tally marks representing the people they saw while participating in King County’s One Night Count of the homeless in Shoreline. Although they found a campsite among brush and leaves while counting, no one was within view of the site.
“In talking to people with more experience, I heard a lot of people will have found shelter from the cold,” volunteer and Shoreline resident Tom Thompson said. “From what I’ve seen by living in the area, I don’t think there will be that many people. They will probably be closer to downtown services but I could be surprised.”
Before 2 a.m. volunteers began assembling at Hopelink in Shoreline to participate in the North end portion of the One Night Count sponsored by the Seattle/King County Coalition for the Homeless.
While fueling up on coffee, volunteers received their group assignments from event coordinator Henry DelleChiaie and former event coordinator and city of Shoreline human services planner George Smith.
“Tonight you guys are here to count the homeless that are on the street,” Smith said. “There will be a simultaneous count tonight of everyone in a shelter… The number you’re counting tonight is just a piece of the One Night Count.”
A larger than expected turnout spurred a few new groups and chances for some to go home or stay behind and help calculate results. But the majority of the volunteers did exactly what they came to do and walked the city streets.
From 2:30 a.m. to 5 a.m. temperatures dipped into the mid 20s and teams of people scoured Shoreline neighborhoods for signs of those without shelter. The number of volunteers outnumbered the total 34 people seen in the city of Shoreline. But the 2,631 people witnessed throughout King County in the outside count represented a 15 percent increase over the number of people that were counted in the 2007 outside count.
“I tell everyone I can’t look at my neighborhood the same way anymore after doing one of these,” DelleChiaie said after the Count.
As executive director of the TeenHope shelter within the city, DelleChiaie said he plans to coordinate the fifth One Night Count in Shoreline next year.
“We had a lot (of volunteers),” he said. “I think that means we can expand our count next year if we get that many people again.”
Smith said the One Night Count is only one opportunity for volunteers to be involved with the issue of homelessness. The One Night Count will be followed with a workshop on Feb. 2 where participants will learn about ways to lobby for and work toward ending homelessness in the region.
“The count is only one measure of how we’re doing on ending homelessness,” he said.
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