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Alameda Countywide Homeless and Special Needs Housing Plan 51 Homelessness in Alameda County , A 2004 survey sponsored by the Alameda Countywide Homeless Continuum of Care Council found that 6,215 people, Including 1,755 children, met the community's definition of homelessness at a point in time. The homeless population is diverse and experiences issues that span many service delivery systems. This chapter presents an overview of data regarding the homeless population in Alameda County and the supportive housing dedicated to this population. (Please refer to Companion Materials, 8. Home/essness in Alameda County: Expanded Version for a more comprehensive overview of information related to this chapter.) Based on the 2005 update to the 2004 survey, this plan estimates that 1,883 chronically homeless single adults and 10,869 community-defined homeless adults and children in Alameda County, comprising approximately 5,264 households, will need long-term housing assistance. The 2005 process updated certain population totals only, not the more detailed attributes of the population. Therefore, this plan utilizes detailed Information from the 2004 survey report in the background sections on homeless ness, but uses the updated 2005 counts to project the amount of housing needed. Please see the chapter entitled Housing Assistance Needs of People Who Are Homeless and/or Have Special Needs for a detailed estimate of the amount and types of housing needed for the plan's three target populations. Who is Homeless in Alameda County? Describing people who are homeless requires first defining who is homeless. There are four definitions of homelessness being used in Alameda County and for which data is available. This plan deals primarily with the broadest definition, community-defined homelessness, and a subset of that population meeting the most specific definition, HUD-defined chronic homelessness. When not specified, this plan uses the community definition ofhomelessness. The community definition of homelessness is probably very close to how most people in Alameda County understand homelessness. It includes people staying in emergency shelters or transitional housing, living on the street or in a car, and people who will lose their housing within a month and have nowhere to go. The HUn definition of chronically homeless includes only single adults with a disability, who have been homeless for a long time or frequently?5 For more detail about all four definitions, please refer to Companion Materials, 8. Homelessness in Alameda County: Expanded Version. The Alameda Countywide Homeless Continuum of Care Council sponsored an extensive count and survey of people utilizing shelter and services in Alameda County, the Alameda Countywide Shelter and Services Survey: County Report (ACSSS), which it released in 2004. (See Companion Materials, 15. Executive Summary from the 2003 Alameda Countywide Shelter and Services Survey.) This survey found that 6,215 people in Alameda County are homeless at a point in time, and that 1,604 people in Alameda County meet HUD's definition of chronic homelessness at a point in time. Since people become homeless and then housed again throughout the year, the 25 Specitically, to meet HUD's definition, they must have been continuously homeless for a year or more, or has had at least four episodes ofhomelessness in the past three years.