Travis County Commissioners find they have more of a homeless problem on their hands than they did before.
Commissioners were discussing federal community development block grants for unincorporated areas of the county when it was noted the annual homeless point in time count revealed more homeless people are in those areas. Kristy Moffatt with Health and Human Services tells commissioners the homeless population in the county has grown sixfold in just one year. “I do think that part of it is that people are moving outside the city of Austin boundaries who are experiencing homelessness because of development and all of that. I think that they are trying to find alternate locations.”
Moffatt goes on to say “You also have a situation where there’s a lot of construction that’s occurring with I-35 and so, TxDOT had done a lot of outreach to people who typically camped underneath those overpasses and talked to them about the construction that was coming to move them into safety.”
Moffatt says the count is also higher because of improvements to the annual point-in-time homeless survey. “I think we’re doing better on the count just finding people. I think that is in part due to the Constable’s Office’s work.”
Commissioners will reveal later this year what all they plan to do to address homelessness.
KLBJ FILE PHOTO
