While locals in Santa Monica were readying up for the 2024 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count on Wednesday evening, volunteers gathering in Venice took to the streets on a similar mission.
The headquarters of Safe Place for Youth (SPY) served as a daytime hub for the 2024 Greater Los Angeles Youth Count, with employees and citizens alike coming and going with new survey data taken from area youth. Wednesday’s count covered Service Area 5, which includes Santa Monica, Malibu, Venice, Beverly Hills, Culver City, Brentwood, Pacific Palisades and Playa del Rey.
Running concurrently to the adult homeless count, the Youth Count is different in data collection methods, acting as a survey-based count where youth (unaccompanied children under 18 and young adults ages 18-24) are asked about their housing status. According to the Youth Count’s website, this is "because housing status cannot be visually assessed for youth." Another factor is the potentially uncounted young people couch surfing or in non-voucher hotels/motels.
The 2023 Youth Count, covering Los Angeles County’s eight service areas (outside of Pasadena, Glendale and Long Beach), showed that the point-in-time estimate of homeless youth was 3,894 persons, a 38% jump from the 2022 count. The 3,894 number was made up of 1,743 sheltered and 1,852 unsheltered individuals.
Service Area 5’s increase from 2022 to 2023 was even more significant, with the 236 youth counted making for a 63% rise. Of the 236 counted in the local service area, 132 were sheltered and 104 were unsheltered. The service area’s population skewed male (55%) for gender, with the most counted race being Black/African-American (101 individuals or 43%).
Starting at SPY, community members traversed the service area, guided by youth volunteers who acted as navigators. Together, they honed their search through various census tracts, created by volunteers and youth to input data of where unhoused individuals may be staying.
"[They came out] to support and identify areas where their peers and other friends who still may be unhoused are staying, so we really value their input," said SPY Housing System Supervisor Maria Rodriguez.
Rodriguez noted that the Youth Count cutoff of 24 years old was part of the 18-24 "transitional age," considering the unique challenges youth face compared to adults.
"There’s different housing options for youth, [this is] geared toward some youth vulnerabilities that are a bit specific to that age range, [like] students experiencing homelessness that are going to college, or foster youth," she added.
SPY began as a volunteer group in 2011, and has since evolved to an organization with over 100 employees, dedicated to serving at-risk youth through services like housing, education and employment. The organization’s Director of Development and Community Impact, Kenneth Jones, said the Youth Count is one way to give youth "resources to be successful to thrive," as county officials use the data to identify causes of youth homelessness and connect youth to services.
"We gotta meet them where they’re at … be trauma-informed, non-judgmentally low bearing," Jones said. "I think at-risk youth … [they’re] facing a number of vulnerabilities, whether its foster care, the juvenile justice system … substance abuse, mental health, [they go] through a range of issues."
