R.I.’s homeless population drops 20%

PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island’s homeless population dropped 20.2 percent in 2010 from 2009, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development reported Tuesday.
But the homeless population declined only 6.5 percent when comparing 2010 with 2007, the Annual Homeless Assessment Report to Congress revealed.
In 2010, 1,282 Rhode Islanders were homeless, or 0.15 percent of the population. The state has 1,321 “permanent supportive housing beds,” which provide subsidized housing to help formerly homeless people live independently.
On Jan. 1, 2010, 76 Rhode Islanders were unsheltered, the report said, meaning they spent the night in a place “not meant for human habitation, such as the streets, abandoned buildings, vehicles, parks, and train stations.”
The report credits the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act with preventing national homelessness from worsening during the economic crisis by establishing the Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-housing Program, which assisted 690,000 people in its first year.
A separate HUD report, “Worst Case Housing Needs 2009,” found that the number of renters who either spend more than half of their income on rent or live in severely inadequate housing increased more than 20 percent nationally between 2007 and 2009.
Rhode Island’s affordable housing program, Neighborhood Opportunities, will lose all funding in Gov. Lincoln D. Chafee’s proposed fiscal 2012 budget.