Studies from the National Institute on Retirement Security say that the average American is only 118 days away from homelessness. While the possibility of not having a place to live seems farfetched to many, it’s an all-too-real reality for millions of Utahns.
Since 2020, Utah has seen a 27% increase in first-time homelessness, according to Erin Alberty, a statistician with Axios Salt Lake City. While this is not an isolated trend, Utah is an outlier among the rest of the United States. Findings from Security.org report that America has a less significant unhoused population today than in 2012, with the majority of unhoused people living in urban areas. In contrast, Utah’s rising homeless rate is opposite to the national average. Research does support the urban pattern, however. The majority of homelessness in Utah is reportedly clustered around Salt Lake City County. Not only this, but homeless individuals around Salt Lake are becoming more often “chronically homeless,” a label used when someone is homeless for over a year.
Even with ongoing research, it is difficult to accurately track homelessness in Utah. Most individuals are only counted after they have spent time in an official housing shelter. Most new shelters have opened in Salt Lake City County, leading some researchers to believe that unhoused people in other counties are quietly — but not statistically — contributing to this ongoing struggle in Utah.
The sum of this information leaves many asking: why? What factors are contributing to this problem in Utah, and what can be done to address homelessness as a state? The answer is multifaceted. One source, Emily Anderson Stern from the Salt Lake Tribune, says, “The likely culprit is the state’s deepening housing crisis.” Her logic stems from the startling housing statistics felt everywhere in the State. The University of Utah’s Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute tells citizens that the rent price in Utah increased more in the two years after the pandemic than in the past decade combined.
Another source, Mrs. Christensen, a former crime scene investigator and current Medical Forensics teacher at Weber, has an opinion that is closer to the pulse of the issue. “From a law enforcement perspective, a lot of the times, if we got called in, there was a crime associated with [the homeless individual.] If they were in a fight or an assault, or sadly, there were lots of drugs that went on.” She continues saying, “I think that’s a huge contributor to our homeless population. We see the legalization of some drugs in other states, and harder illegal drugs within the state too… there are not the correct social programs to get people away from addiction, and if they are, many people aren’t in the right frame of mind to choose to get away from that lifestyle.” Christensen’s observations match the data. “Mental illness rates in Utah’s homeless population rose from about 28% to 41%, with substance abuse disorder rates growing from 16% to 26% from 2021 to 2022,” says Alberty, the statistician mentioned previously. Other factors also contribute to homelessness. A study snapshot from the Utah Women & Leadership Project notes that minority women were disproportionately more likely to become unhoused than their White female counterparts.
Since 2020, Utah has seen a 27% increase in first-time homelessness
With so many intersectional causes, including mental illness, substance abuse, domestic violence and systemic poverty, there are a number of solutions being proposed and initiated. Wayne Niederhouser, a State Homeless Coordinator at the First Step House in Salt Lake, has been a major advocate for these solutions. Addressing the complicated nature of homelessness in Utah, Niederhouser says, “Despite years of focused effort and spending millions of dollars to solve problems, Utah’s experience with homelessness has proved to be perpetual and challenging.” His organization has proposed several goals and strategies, including creating housing opportunities, targeting vulnerable subpopulations (such as veterans and disabled people), and increasing “supportive services.”
Some citizens are skeptical about what these “supportive services” entail. Controversy arose when it was disclosed that of the statewide $10M set aside to address homelessness in 2022, 91% of this funding went toward ‘public safety expenditures,’ namely law enforcement. Only 5% of funding statewide went to social programs and 4% to community outreach for families and neighborhoods. Christensen comments on the role of law enforcement in dealing with unhoused people, commenting, “It really has to be a want and desire for these guys to clean up. Many times, the jails and the prisons can help provide resources while they’re there, including resources and things that they can even take with them, but it’s hard for them to stay clean after they’re out of that system. It’s sad. It’s really sad, because a lot of the time when we’re called in, these are mind-altering drugs. They may not be in their right mind to want to get help.”
Preventative care and a stepping-stone approach to homelessness may be a more effective strategy. “I am a huge proponent of psychiatric care, 100%,” says Christensen. “Everyone should be learning about their own coping skills and then people can do better for themselves, even if they’re not in a crisis situation.” One unhoused person, Carlos Jarlegui, echoes a more non-linear approach to solving the problem in his interview with Eric S. Peterson from KUER 90.1. “I’m 61 years old and I want to be normal,” he says, adding that he doesn’t always trust the safety of the shelter system. “Why not have sanctioned camping areas for those on their way to permanent housing?”
Clearly, there is no cure-all for homelessness in Utah. It will require policymakers, unhoused individuals, law enforcement, social programs and mental healthcare reforms to chip away at this growing issue.
On a student level, Weber High is not immune to noticing the growing unhoused population in Utah, but more work needs to be done to inform students. 50% of Weber High students who answered an anonymous social media poll said that they believed that homelessness was “worsening,” while 32% said that “they weren’t sure” if homelessness was worsening or improving. With more information and research, the rising generation can approach the issue of homelessness with greater compassion, data and logic.
“Choose kindness,” says Christensen. “Give the same respect to a homeless person as you would to any other person. They’re still human. If we can choose a little more kindness and empathy, and try to see things from a new perspective, maybe that would allow more room for [unhoused people] to reach out and find help.”