“Where did you sleep last night?”

An uninhabitable place like a tent, the underside of a bridge or in a vehicle? A homeless shelter or a warming shelter? On a friend’s couch or in a transitional situation?

About 100 volunteers, many of whom work at agencies that provide services to homeless people, will be on the streets of El Paso County on Monday to ask these questions while administering the annual Point in Time census.

Communities are required to count people who don’t have stable housing to receive federal funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Homelessness decreased countywide by 12% last year compared to 2023, according to the count from January 2024, which was released in late August. There were 156 fewer homeless people last year with 1,146 total residents considered “sheltered,” meaning sleeping in emergency shelters and transitional housing, or “unsheltered” in uninhabitable places.

That’s 156 fewer homeless people than in 2023, with the county recording lower numbers for several years.

The information collected from the count doesn’t provide a complete picture of the state of homelessness but does yield useful data, according to Merrina Mendez, community relations coordinator for the homeless initiatives team at Community Health Partnership, a nonprofit that administers the survey for the Pikes Peak Continuum of Care.

“While the Point in Time is important to measure and monitor trends and changes on local and national levels, it is just a snapshot,” she said. “Each community nationwide is using one singular night within the last 10 days of January, and we’re able to see from this data who is still not using public resources and why. It helps us identify gaps and build bridges.”

For the third consecutive year, members of the Colorado Springs Homeless Union, a grassroots group of people who were formerly or are presently homeless, will be deployed and compensated for assisting with tracking down people and asking them to consider filling out the questionnaire.

“Street teams with lived expertise help ensure a more accurate count,” said Kristy Milligan, CEO of Westside CARES, a homeless service provider that pays for the homeless union members’ time.

“This initiative has been so successful in the past that we codified it in our annual budget, with recognition that it is a dignified way to engage our neighbors,” she said.

The Pikes Peak Continuum of Care, a consortium of service providers, also tracks data year-round on military veterans and youth homelessness and the use of soup kitchens, shelters and rehousing programs for a more complete look than the one night in January.

“That gives us a stronger sense of the pervasiveness of the challenge,” Milligan said, “particularly because the Point in Time adheres to a narrow definition of homelessness.”

The count excludes people in jail or other institutional environments such as in-patient hospitals and addiction centers, as well as people who may have gotten a motel for the night or went to a relative’s house, for example.

In the week leading up to the Point in Time survey, about 320 homeless people were being held in the county jail each night, according to daily population reports from the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office.

According to a HUD spokesperson, one thing the Point in Time count does not do is “drive either funding levels or the allocation of funding across communities.”

Congress sets funding levels for HUD homelessness assistance grants that Continuums of Care receive, he said, and HUD distributes the funds through a competitive process.

The Point in Time count is just one of many factors considered for competitive funding, the spokesman said via email. Other factors include system performance measures, coordination efforts and a demonstration that the community uses a fair and equitable process for determining funding.

However, in recent years, Continuums of Care that report decreases in homeless populations in their geographic areas have received the maximum points, according to HUD.

But that doesn’t mean that communities that report increases won’t receive funding for new projects, the spokesman said, and vice versa, as even communities that see headcount decreases are not necessarily awarded funding for new projects.

El Paso County received $3.9 million in the 2024 fiscal year and $2.8 million in 2023 from HUD for the Pikes Peak Continuum of Care to “establish local priorities and strategies to address homelessness.”

For 2024 those categories included rapid rehousing by Catholic Charities of Central Colorado, TESSA’s Housing First for victims of domestic violence, consolidated permanent supportive housing initiatives, a coordinated entry and management system that records who uses what services and other programs.

The city of Colorado Springs also receives Emergency Solutions Grants from HUD, which in 2023 was $267,000 for emergency shelters and related services, along with homelessness prevention, outreach and rapid rehousing.

Census takers likely will encounter weather extremes this year, Mendez said, and experience what facing the elements can be like for a short time.

Talking with homeless people face-to-face provides an opportunity to “meet them where they’re at,” hear their stories, listen to their grievances, and provide support and validation, she said.

It’s also a chance to ask people who aren’t using services if they know about the city’s shelters, services and resources. Participants who fill out the survey also receive an incentives care package with donated items such as gloves, hand warmers, protein bars and restaurant gift cards.

Counting will extend into Thursday of this week, with the bulk of the activity happening on Monday, as volunteers scour the downtown core, intersections, sidewalks, parks, libraries, trails, urban camps and outlying areas of the county on the following days.

The data is due to HUD in April but won’t be released publicly until the end of summer, according to Mendez.