Homelessness in the U.S. has remained almost flat in 2018, highlighting the magnitude of the problem in Seattle, where the number of homeless people swelled by more than 10 times the national average, according to new federal data.

Homelessness rose 0.3 percent nationally this year, according to a report released Monday by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The agency announced the results of counts of homeless people from one night in January in more than 3,000 cities and counties, a study that’s been conducted annually for more than a decade. Seattle remained — as it has since 2015 — third in the nation when it comes to the sheer number of homeless people.In Seattle, which is now spending around $90 million dollars on fighting homelessness, local politicians have asked for more investment from the federal government to build affordable housing. Earlier this year, the consulting firm McKinsey & Company estimated that King County needs another 14,000 affordable units for people experiencing homelessness and that annual spending would need to double to $410 million to adequately address the crisis. According to a draft action report from the county’s Regional Affordable Housing Task Force, the county will need more than 100,000 new housing units affordable to the region’s lowest-income people by the year 2040.Seattle Times

Notes:
Homelessness in the U.S. remained largely unchanged in 2018, according to the latest national estimate by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). HUD’s 2018 Annual Homeless Assessment Report to Congress https://www.hudexchange.info/resources/documents/2018-AHAR-Part-1.pdf
Booming cities, unintended consequences https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/future-of-cities/booming-cities-unintended-consequences