Lots of of volunteers spanned out throughout the 5 boroughs early Wednesday, working by means of the evening to survey unhoused New Yorkers for the annual Homeless Outreach Inhabitants Estimate, or HOPE, depend.
They canvassed subway stations and sidewalks, pedestrian plazas and parks, in neighborhoods with an apparent inhabitants of unsheltered individuals and in neighborhoods that don’t have as many.
It was the twenty first depend, and the primary the place temperatures weren’t close to or beneath freezing, as this yr’s occasion was rescheduled from late January as a result of excessive chilly.
For Erin Dalton, the newly-appointed commissioner of the Division of Social Companies, it was her first public occasion since taking over the position.
“It is a nice expertise to be with volunteers, outreach employees – individuals actually care in regards to the problems with homelessness,” she mentioned contained in the P.S. 116 fitness center in Kips Bay, the place officers kicked off the depend.
The rescheduled date led to a drop-off in volunteers, a spokesperson mentioned, however almost 1,300 confirmed up Tuesday evening, alongside 240 outreach employees.
The HOPE depend supplies helpful information as town grapples with an estimated inhabitants of greater than 85,000 unhoused New Yorkers who sought house in metropolis shelters. Final yr’s HOPE depend discovered 4,504 individuals experiencing unsheltered homelessness when it was taken on Jan. 28, 2025.
Greater than 20 individuals had been discovered lifeless exterior throughout this traditionally chilly winter, placing town’s shelter and outreach insurance policies beneath a microscope. Though not all of those that died exterior had been technically unhoused — and none had been discovered dwelling in encampments — critics faulted Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s choice to cease encampment sweeps, which he mentioned in December hadn’t been profitable in connecting individuals to long-term housing.
He later reversed his place, placing Division of Homeless Companies outreach employees within the lead, as an alternative of the police or sanitation employees.
The swap might drastically change the outcomes for individuals dwelling exterior, Dalton mentioned.
“Let’s deal with those that are most susceptible, individuals who’ve determined they’re not going to just accept conventional choices,” she mentioned. “They’re traumatized by the companies they might have acquired previously, and so they’ve determined, amongst the harshest situations, to remain exterior.”
Individuals trying to reform town’s insurance policies and outreach in the direction of unsheltered individuals was one purpose the HOPE depend started within the first place.
Maryanne Schretzman is the manager director of the Heart for Innovation by means of Information Intelligence, a metropolis workplace that works with all well being and human companies businesses to establish what’s wanted.
She helped begin the HOPE depend, first as a pilot in Manhattan and Brooklyn earlier than increasing citywide in 2005, partly as a result of town was “continually being sued” by organizations like Authorized Support, she mentioned.
“The advocates had been saying there have been tens and tens of 1000’s of individuals [on the street] and we weren’t clear if that was true or not,” she mentioned. “So we wished to get a pulse on what that precise depend is, in order that if we knew what the numbers had been, then we will handle to these numbers.”
Their methodology is to flood town unexpectedly, even in “low” areas the place there isn’t normally any road homeless, to get as correct an image.
Volunteers watched a video coaching earlier than Tuesday evening and acquired one other refresher earlier than heading out at midnight. Inside PS 116’s fitness center, just a few dozen individuals gathered at tables to go over their protection areas, loading up on donuts and low and sweet to prepare to remain up by means of the evening.
Olivia Waldron, 23, discovered in regards to the depend final yr by means of her job on the Robin Hood Basis. She was the captain of Staff 9, which reporters from THE CITY joined.
She was struck by how linked she felt to town throughout her first depend final yr. Individuals usually need a village, she added, “however they don’t wish to be a villager.”
“Lots of people who … complain about issues: town goes by means of an affordability disaster,” she mentioned. “It’s good to have technique and empathy to repair these issues.”
After midnight, Staff 9’s 4 members canvassed the twenty eighth Road 6 and R and W stations, together with streets alongside Broadway and Sixth Avenue.
The work wrapped up after 1 a.m., with round 15 individuals tracked. Not everybody was unhoused, and never everybody spoke to the group; the app permits for observations of people that look like homeless and asleep.
Some teams didn’t encounter anybody who was unhoused. THE CITY additionally went out in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, however didn’t discover anybody.
The ultimate tally, despatched out Wednesday morning, mentioned volunteers lined 1,491 distinctive areas throughout town, though the complete information shall be launched later this yr.
Dalton mentioned the HOPE depend expertise might change individuals’s notion of who’s experiencing homelessness
“Individuals will see each what individuals assume is homelessness, but additionally the altering face of homelessness, which is older, people who find themselves working,” she mentioned. “Individuals who have spent their complete lives working however simply discover themselves crowded out of the housing market.”
