ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
U.S. homelessness numbers have gone up again to a record high. The federal agency that does the count released its figures today and cites rising rents, among other factors. But Biden administration officials say it seems possible the number of unhoused people has fallen since the count was done nearly a year ago. NPR's Jennifer Ludden joins us to sort through these results. Hi, Jennifer.
JENNIFER LUDDEN, BYLINE: Hi, Ari.
SHAPIRO: Will you first explain what this snapshot count is and what it showed this year?
LUDDEN: Yes, so this is a count that takes place all around the country, every January. It's compiled by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. And this year, it found 770,000 people living in shelters or outside on streets, in parks and their cars. That is up 18% from last year...
SHAPIRO: Eighteen percent.
LUDDEN: ...And it is the largest number since they started doing this report...
SHAPIRO: Wow.
LUDDEN: ...In 2007. Yes. And it is - I should also note - an undercount. It's widely considered an undercount. This is a snapshot - one night in each place. It does not include people who may be crowding in with family or friends.
Now, to explain this rise, HUD officials and others point, above all, to the skyrocketing rents that we've seen in the past few years. They also cite the recent increase in migrants coming to the U.S. without a place to live, especially migrant families, and extreme weather disasters, for example, the fire in Maui last year.
SHAPIRO: We've reported on each of those things individually. So why do officials who put out this annual count think the homelessness numbers might have actually improved since the count was done in January?
LUDDEN: Right. And we will see whether they have. But for one thing, in June, President Biden took action to limit asylum claims and cap illegal border crossings. Since then, HUD officials say that cities like Denver, Chicago and New York, who have really been overwhelmed with asylum-seekers, have reported a dramatic drop in migrants in their shelters. Also, the number of homeless veterans fell this year to a record low. That was one bright spot in the report, and there has been a lot of spending on subsidized housing for them. Rents are also not going up as much. They're even down in some places.
I spoke with Jeff Olivet who, until recently, headed the government's Interagency Council on Homelessness. And he says even some big cities where the problem has been growing saw a turnaround.
JEFF OLIVET: We've seen either stabilizing of the numbers or reduction of the numbers in some pretty unlikely places, like Phoenix and Los Angeles and Dallas. And to me, what that says is if we keep investing the right way in getting people off the streets and into housing as quickly as possible, we really can see those numbers go down.
LUDDEN: The Biden administration has touted how it has boosted spending on housing subsidies specifically for homeless people. But there has been some opposition to that kind of spending, including among allies of President-elect Trump.
SHAPIRO: Yeah, so what can you tell us about how the Trump administration is likely to approach homelessness?
LUDDEN: Well, there is a push among his allies to shift spending away from housing and more toward requiring treatment for drug addiction or mental health problems. President-elect Trump has also supported - expressed a lot of support for bans on so-called street camping, where cities and states passed laws to make it a crime to sleep outside in public. We are seeing an uptick in this - more people getting citations or even being arrested. Housing advocates do worry that those kinds of changes could only make the problem worse. But there is just a lot of public frustration over homelessness. And, you know, people are seeing what today's numbers show, that, at least in some places, there are more - even more people living on streets, in parks and other public places.
SHAPIRO: That's NPR's Jennifer Ludden. Thank you.
LUDDEN: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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