Individuals living in encampments are overwhelmingly long-term residents of the City of San Rafael.
The City of San Rafael and its nonprofit partners serving homeless individuals recently conducted a survey in the City’s major encampments asking this question among others. Almost 90% of individuals staying in the encampments have been in San Rafael for more than one year, and almost two-thirds have been in San Rafael for more than a decade. Many individuals camping in the City grew up here, attended San Rafael schools, and hope to find permanent affordable housing in this community.
According to the 2022 Homeless Point-in-Time Count, a bi-annual field study of local homelessness, 78% of all people currently experiencing homelessness across Marin report living in Marin prior to losing their housing. Across the nine Bay Area counties, 70-85% of people experiencing homelessness in a given county also lost their housing in that county. Homelessness is a local issue, impacting all communities due to the regional affordable housing crisis.
Are most of Marin County’s homeless people in San Rafael? According to the 2022 Homeless Point-in-Time Count, 773 of the 1,121 people experiencing homelessness in Marin County (69%) were located OUTSIDE of San Rafael, compared to 348 (31%) staying inside San Rafael.