Every January, local social service groups set out to count the number of homeless people in their communities. The federal government uses the results of this point-in-time count to determine funding.
This year, the number of people counted as homeless in Josephine County fell from 559 to 319.
But Heyleigh Strempel, with the nonprofit UCAN, said that the drop is likely inaccurate.
"While we do a lot of getting people from the streets into housing, there's not that many houses available in Grants Pass," she said. "From our own kind of observations and statistics, we know that there's likely more than what we counted."
Five days before the count, the city of Grants Pass swept its largest homeless camp. Strempel said that may have driven homeless people farther away, making them harder to find.
Nationwide, the number of people experiencing homelessness increased by 18% between 2023 and 2024, according to the 2024 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
There are also concerns about the accuracy or usefulness of these numbers.
Data collection methods have improved over the years, with more people using an app instead of paper surveys.
"The data quality is just getting better year after year," said Shri Sharma, a data analyst for the group that supervises the point-in-time count for most of Oregon. "With data quality, you can never say it's perfect because there's always going to be something."
Obtaining an accurate count remains challenging for a variety of reasons.
"It's all done by volunteers," said Kristen Schreder, who oversees the count in far Northern California. "It's a pretty big undertaking. When you look at how many people we counted — 2,300 people — that's a little bit of work."
She said her team begins earlier every year. This year, they plan to start preparing in July for the January 2026 count.
Schreder said she'd rather see service providers focus on other metrics.
"A better goal," she said, "is to look at the programs that are offered and show what our goals are and show the data on how we have achieved those goals."
Schreder said California is currently working to improve how it measures homelessness services.
This year's count still needs to be verified by HUD.
