For the second year, SARM participated in the annual Point-in-Time (PIT)) survey on the night of January 28, 2025, which was conducted to determine the demographics of the homeless in San Antonio and Bexar County. The guests at SARM were asked a number of questions about their experience of homelessness. Over 400 volunteers participated in the event city-wide. Volunteers split into 75 teams, each assigned to a geographic area and combed the city to find unsheltered people to participate in the approximate 5-minute survey. Totals are later added to the sheltered population to understand the scope of homelessness in the city.
Also called the “census for homelessness”, the PIT is a one-night snapshot mandated by the Housing and Urban Development and carried out nationwide. The hundreds of participating cities must hold their counts in the last ten days of January in order to qualify for federal funding.
The survey provides valuable information to the South Alamo Regional Alliance for the Homeless (SARAH), now called Close to Home. The information will be provided to the HUD Homelessness Data Exchange (HDX) for national reporting. The Texas Homeless Network provides information about homelessness in Texas and will publish the Point-in-time results.
The figures from Tuesday’s count won’t be available until the spring. The 2024 PIT count recorded a total of 3,372 homeless individuals with 888 living unsheltered. This is a 6.8% spike in San Antonio’s homeless population over the prior year and a 17.4% increase since 2019’s pre-pandemic levels.
(Information taken from Jan. 29. 2025 article in the San Antonio Current entitled “Volunteers Conduct Annual Point-in-Time Count of San Antonio’s Homeless Population” by Stephanie Koithan)
