The City of Santa Monica recognizes that homelessness is a complex and troubling issue.

Our vision is to transform Santa Monica to a place where our effective action and compassion end the impact of homelessness on our community.  Learn more:

 About Homelessness in Santa Monica

The Community Responds: Action Plan & Initiatives

How Can I Get Involved?

Frequently Asked Questions

How We Collect Data

Links and Resources

Key Findings of the 2010 Santa Monica Homeless Count

This year, the City of Santa Monica opted to begin conducting a city-wide Homeless Count on an annual basis.  This commitment goes above and beyond the federal and regional requirements to conduct bi-annual homeless counts. The community responded with equal enthusiasm and dedication, with over 160 community members turning out to walk and drive every street, park, alley and underpass to enumerate homeless individuals in the City over the course of one evening.

Employing the improved methodology implemented in the 2009 Homeless Count, we are able to more accurately compare results to 2009 and provide the most complete count findings to date. The data will serve as a benchmark from which further reductions in homelessness will be tracked and the success of local efforts to reduce homelessness evaluated. Last year, the 2009 Count showed an overall reduction of 8% city-wide as compared to 2007. This year’s results are based on a one-year comparison between 2009 and 2010.

Results: The 2010 Santa Monica Homeless Count showed a significant reduction in the number of homeless individuals living in Santa Monica.

 ·         The overall homeless population declined 18.9% from 2009

o        2007 total = 999

o        2009 total = 915 (8% reduction over 2007)

o        2010 total = 742 (18.9% reduction over 2009 / 25% reduction over 2007)

·         The point-in-time homeless count is 742

o       This includes a point-in-time street homeless population of 264, a shelter and institutions population of 423 individuals, and 55 cars/encampments.

o        71% were single individuals, while 29% were members of families.

·         There was a 68% reduction in the number of identified encampments and a 59% reduction in the number of people identified living in cars as compared to 2009.

 This reduction is consistent with findings in urban areas across the county over the past several years, which is acknowledged to be due to changes in federal priorities, better data collection methods, and expanded access to affordable housing for homeless and at-risk households. The City understands that this visual point-in-time count is useful in telling us “what” is happening in our city, but alone, it cannot fully reveal “why”. This local reduction can be attributed to a number of factors, including the city’s implementation of the Action Plan to Address Homelessness, better collaboration and coordination of services, new housing subsidies and rental assistance programs, and innovative programs such as the Homeless Community Court and Project Homecoming. Over the next six months, the City will do additional analysis of this data, comparing it with data from our service providers and regional partners to try to establish if this is truly a sustainable trend.

Methodology: On January 27, 2010, over 160 community volunteers were divided into 70 small teams, each of which was assigned a specific geographic area of the city. Together, volunteers covered every street and alley in Santa Monica, a total of 226 linear miles. Volunteers were instructed to tally every homeless individual they encountered as well as every car, RV, tent or box in which someone appeared to be living. Homeless individuals in shelters, jails, motels, and hospitals were simultaneously counted by staff at each facility in the city. This method of visual enumeration is one that is accepted by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and is used by many other communities across the country, including Los Angeles County. While larger jurisdictions employ a mix of a visual count in selected census tracts combined with a statistical projection of homelessness in un-counted tracts, the City has chosen to do a full visual count of all 19 census tracts within the city boundaries.

Click here for the presentation and map

Vulnerability Index Skid Row, Los Angeles

In December 2007, Common Ground worked with LA City and LA County to create a by-name list (registry) of the people sleeping on the streets of Skid Row who were at the greatest risk of dying through the use of our Vulnerability Index Survey.

As a result over 50 people were housed!

Click here to visit the project's Facebook group.

Click here to visit the webpage of LA County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky and learn more.

 The Costs of Homelessness

People who are homeless often use a variety of costly public systems. National data illustrates the ways in which homelessness can be costly.

Click here to learn more.

Year-End Wrap-Up: By the Numbers

• 30% reduction in homeless-related calls to Paramedics (2006 to 2008)
• 8% reduction in homelessness (2007 to 2009)
• Drop of 13% in residents’ perception of the seriousness of homelessness in Santa Monica (2007 to 2009)
• 15 presentations, conversations and learning opportunities with faith, neighborhood, civic, student, academic and hospitality groups (FY08-09)
• 4 City Departments/Divisions (Rent Control, Police, Fire and Facilities staff) trained to respond to the needs of homeless individuals (FY08-09)

 Service Registry Update

Elizabeth, a 68 year-old woman who was homeless in Santa Monica for over 10 years, is one of the people on the Service Registry. Last winter Elizabeth was surveyed and found to be vulnerable and likely to die on our streets unless she was housed. Six months ago, OPCC Daybreak staff helped Elizabeth move into her own apartment in Santa Monica. Today she’s living on her own, part of a micro-enterprise art project, is an active member of a senior center and stays connected to the strong Daybreak community.   

Nationally, identifying people who are vulnerable, using intensive interdisciplinary teams and doing “whatever it takes” to get people into housing is considered a best practice. Since 2004 when the Chronic Homeless Project launched, the City of Santa Monica and partners have been using this model and other approaches to help people exit homelessness.

Additional vulnerable homeless individuals have been added to the Service Registry, bringing the total number of people on the Registry to 391. The new individuals were identified by service providers, the Santa Monica Police Department and the Santa Monica Fire Department as having been homeless for long periods of time and frequent users of local resources. Click here for their outcomes.

Reducing Homelessness: Innovations and Results
Report to the Santa Monica City Council
April 14, 2009

Innovations, collaborations and the dedication of an interdisciplinary team have lead to dramatic results.
Click here to download a copy of the presentation.

 Updated Action Plan to Address Homelessness Approved

In March 2009 the Santa Monica City Council approved an update to the Action Plan to Address Homelessness in Santa Monica. Click here to download the plan.

This page was last modified on 03/05/2010