Huron County's Homelessness Program Supervisor says the county has several partners working hard together to address the issue of homelessness in the county.
Erin Schooley says they're slowly making changes.
“We're slowly making changes to work as a coordinated system better than we were and with the inclusion now of a by-name list and coordinated access to our suite of programs I think we can, over time, begin to be more intentional and more strategic in how we are able to match and refer people," Schooley shared.
The by-name list is helping them keep track of and stay in contact with homeless people, but Schooley says it still doesn't give them an accurate number of the homeless people in the county, because the list only contains the names of people who have consented to be on the list, so she knows the number on the list is a conservative number.
Schooley says the list is helpful in providing a snap shop of what's happening.
“We're holding individual and systemic data. It helps us to see trends but it doesn't necessarily account for everybody because we really have to make sure that we're working with people who are consenting and also when people become inactive and they're not working with their agencies, we may lose track of them for a period of time," noted Schooley.
She adds they're working hard to improve that. Schooley says there are still a lot of barriers that get in the way for people to obtain affordable housing. But she adds, she's very proud of some of the steps that Huron County has taken to move ahead with new builds and she acknowledges it will take some time before those things come to fruition.