OEO Releases Their 2016 One-Night-Count Report

By: Ari Kisler, VCRHYP Assistant Director

This Vermont Office of Economic Opportunity recently released their 2016 Emergency Shelter and Transitional Housing One-Night-Count report and youth are highlighted throughout. The one night count focuses only on those programs funded by the Housing Opportunity Grant Program (HOP). As explained in the report's analysis, an overall increase was seen in the total number of “guests in publicly funded, community-based emergency housing,” which is likely attributed to an increase in capacity.

This begs the question: if we continue to increase our capacity, will we continue to see an increase in guest numbers? I don’t think any of us would argue that our capacity around the state is not great enough to meet our need.

Here’s what OEO’s 2016 One-Night-Count shows us about youth in HOP-funded emergency shelter:

·      75 more youth under the age of 18 were counted this year: this is a 39% increase from last year

·      7% of all persons in this year’s count were unaccompanied youth under the age of 25: 10 youth under the age of 18 were unaccompanied; 47 youth between the ages of 18 and 24 were unaccompanied

·      Nearly 5% of all persons in the count were parenting youth under the age of 25: 12 youth under the age of 18 were parenting; 29 youth between the ages of 18 and 24 were parenting

·      Households with children in domestic violence shelters increased by 7% from last year

To view the full report, click here: 2016 Final Report

VCRHYP has been invited to be a part of the HOP Advisory Group and I will be attending their upcoming meeting in February. Hopefully this will be an opportunity to continue the great work our member agency programs have done around utilizing HOP funding for youth in need of shelter!