Jun 16 2009
Fruit of the Poisoned Tree
There is still a belief that the number of homeless vets is exploding in the country. Tune into just about any newscast and you will hear a story about the former military downtrodden. The numbers are shocking — and misleading.
There might, in fact, be a decline in the veteran homeless population. In 2005, the VA estimated the number of homeless veterans to be 194,254 of the 744,313 homeless nationwide. Today VA officials place that count at 131,000.
But where do these figures come from?
VA officials have said they rely on estimates from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The VA also has confirmed it uses evening bed counts from a hodgepodge of shelters and other places of homeless refuge around the country. If a guest tells a shelter he or she is a vet, then he (or she) counts as a veteran. Done. Add those up and you get the number of homeless vets in America.
The National Coalition for the Homeless pegs the VA’s current number at 154,000 and says there is “an estimated 300,000 veterans homeless at some time during the year.” It is said the VA only reaches one-third (or 100,000), leaving the remaining 200,000 to seek help from the communities. (Huh?)
We’ll go out on a limb again: it seems safe to say no one knows the homeless veteran population in this country, and that might be OK — except for the taxpayer funds devoted to homeless vets.
The current budget for VA homeless veterans programs is $400 million and officials expect that to increase to more than $500 million next year. Anyone who says “I’m a vet!” receives basic outreach and referral services. Beyond that, the VA says recipients must be bonafide vets. It is the VA that establishes eligibility for services.
A VA spokesman reminded us that President George W. Bush mandated cities develop 10-year plans to end homelessness. The VA says it has a responsibility to do its part, and thus funds beds for veterans in the shelters and sponsors “stand downs” to get clothing and medical attention to this population.
Assets dedicated to help unconfirmed veterans might play well with some groups, but potentially steers limited assets from known veterans seeking VA assistance. It happens every day.
This is a discussion without meaning – in that there is no way *anyone* can have a valid grasp on the number of homeless veterans, vis-a-vis the gross number of homeless people in this country.
The U. S. Government doesn’t have a handle on the number of its citizens, green card immigrants, undocumented/illegal immigrants, or any others in the US at any given time, who are homeless; much less have a demographic breakdown on them. The idea that any number of homeless you might see cited for a given category: males, females. children, families, veterans, etc.; quoted by some government or non-government source has any validity is ludicrous.
This is a prime example of GiGo. Not least of all, because as you know and I know, an unknown quantity of the hard-corps homeless, for whatever reason that seems logical to them, are ensuring they fly at low level underneath any radar. We see (or “not see”) them all the time in Old Town Alexandria where we live. Of the two dozen of those I regularly see, three of them I am sure are ex-military, maybe another three likely, a dozen unlikely, and all bets off on the rest.
OJ, you wound me. I guess the circular meaning is the concern over the assets expended. Nothing against the homeless, and I completely agree with you – no one knows the numbers, but news outlets quote them with a seeming air of authority. Take that one step further and categorize this fluid population as veterans and you are tossing money and resources not at a VA issue, but a societal situation. As we have seen and possibly experienced, the vets who need assistance (homeless or otherwise) may be pushed to the side for this nebulous population. And, talk to the guys at Vermont Ave., and they’re good with it. They get it, but they are good with it.
The homeless healthcare situation at the VA medical centers is another tale of woe for another woeful day.
I didn’t mean to wound you, Gina. As you well know the issue of homeless veterans at the VA medical centers is well known to me. My thrust was, that, given that there are no known reliable numbers for the homeless in the US, much less a demographic breakdown for them, *any* numbers quoted in an article, yours or anyone else’s, are questionable at best even if a qualifying statement is made as to their source, basis, and an estimate of the statistical accuracy of the figure is provided; and ludicrous without such qualifying statements.
I agree that the VA’s efforts should be devoted to true veterans, and not psuedo-(whether physical poseurs, or statistical ghosts dreamed up by someone without any basis).
A wise man has been quoted as saying “There are lies, damned lies and statistics.” Regretably, I felt most of the numbers you used met his expectations for the latter. Sure, someone used them. Where? When? Based on what? What is their confidence level for those numbers?
Sorry. But I spent a lot more time in systems analysis than I have in {vintage/antique} sales. ;->
[...] seems from the data available, veteran homelessness should not be a VA priority. As we recounted in Fruit of the Poisoned Tree, the VA estimates homeless veterans at 131,000, down from the 199,000 it reported in 2005. The VA [...]