At least 60 volunteers will bundle up and head out for statewide survey vital to federal funding for services.
This story was originally published in Rhode Island Current, a publication partner of Ocean State Stories.
PROVIDENCE — When teams of volunteers fan out across Rhode Island after dark Tuesday on a mission that will take them through parks, alongside highway ramps, and into alleyways and parking lots, they will need to dress warmly.
The weather forecast calls for the temperature to drop as low as six degrees in Providence. But the number that will matter the most is how many people are spending the overnight hours outside.
At least 60 volunteers are signed up to conduct the state’s annual Point in Time Count, a federally mandated census that creates a snapshot of how many people are homeless on a winter’s night. The data collected from every state is used to determine federal funding.
Jessica Lachey, director of development at Thrive Behavioral Healthcare in Warwick, will be participating in the annual census for the third consecutive year. But she and other volunteers stop by encampments all year long. During cold weather, they often pass out blankets and propane tanks to keep homeless Rhode Islanders warm.
“We basically do this every day,” Lachey said. “We’ll bring a lot of warming gear.”
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) requires every state’s Continuum of Care program — the network of agencies and nonprofits that manage a state’s homelessness response — to conduct the annual Point in Time Count.
The date of the count varies from state to state — HUD’s only requirement is that it be done within the last 10 days of January — but the goal is the same all over the country: create a snapshot of the number of individuals experiencing homelessness on a given night during the coldest time of the year when people are more likely to use shelters.
“That does typically make it easier to count, but we’ll still be outside,” said Partaja “PJ” Spann, director of Rhode Island outreach for Newport Mental Health.
Both Newport Mental Health and Thrive are Rhode Island Continuum of Care member agencies.
Unlike prior year counts, the state’s Executive Office of Housing is responsible for overseeing volunteers — a job previously handled by the Rhode Island Coalition to End Homelessness.
The coalition will continue to clean, validate and analyze the data to submit the estimate of the state’s unhoused population to the federal government.
The final numbers will likely be submitted in April, Jenna Thomas, the coalition’s data coordinator of the state’s portion of the Homeless Management Information System, told the Rhode Island Continuum of Care board during its Jan. 7 meeting.
That’s earlier than last year when Rhode Island’s final count was submitted in June and formally presented before the state’s Continuum of Care board in September. Volunteers counted at least 2,373 unhoused individuals across the state on the night of Jan. 21, 2025 — representing a 2.8% decrease from the record high of 2,442 in 2024.
Volunteer training is still the primary responsibility of the coalition, which produced a 17-minute video detailing how to use the state’s database. When locating unsheltered clients, volunteers must note the person’s living situation, their location, and how long they’ve been outside.
The methodology on how to approach the count follows core guidelines established by HUD. The guidelines cover how to remove duplicate data, ensure direct interaction with homeless persons, and where surveyors should go the census night.
Thomas said guidance has usually been updated on an annual basis. But during a December call with homeless data administrators from across the country, she said HUD confirmed no new notice was coming for the 2026 count and that continuum boards should use last year’s guidance.
HUD did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
7 p.m. start
Surveys for the Point in Time Count can be done for a week following the “blitz” night taking place Tuesday — as many teams likely can’t get into every encampment. The coalition’s guidance allows surveyors to visit shelters and other warming centers where they can ask where clients were during the night of the Point in Time Count.
Emily Marshall, spokesperson for the state’s Executive Office of Housing, said about eight teams have been assembled to go out starting around 7 p.m. They’ll cover Providence, Pawtucket, along with municipalities in northern Rhode Island and in Bristol, Kent, Newport, and Washington counties.
“Teams are built intentionally to balance experience and local knowledge, ensuring coverage of both highly visible locations and more hidden or remote areas,” Marshall said in an email.
Lachey said her team expected to wrap up their survey by 11 p.m. Thrive’s outreach team is constantly out around Kent County connecting with people at known encampment locations to ensure they’re comfortable the night of the count.
“People who are unhoused have a lot of distrust in the system,” she said. “But when you see these people day in and day out — now we have a relationship, and they talk.”
It’s the same approach Spann’s team of volunteers in Newport have taken. While the center’s outreach team likely won’t get to every encampment on Aquidneck Island Tuesday, she said individuals and their locations are fairly well-known ahead of time.
“They’re familiar faces,” Spann said. “It’s very rare we come across an encampment or an individual we have never had contact with.”
Some people are more willing to discuss their living arrangements or other personal identification than others. Spann said surveyors honor the privacy of those who don’t want to share information.
“We’re just trying to get a head count for numbers,” she said. “Data drives the narratives, the grants and the funding — getting accurate data is the first step so we know how to support the exact number of people we need to support.”
