Announcement kicks off campaign to recruit 1,200 volunteers for the single-night survey of people experiencing homelessness in Austin/Travis County

AUSTIN, Texas (Sept. 26, 2024) – The Ending Community Homelessness Coalition (ECHO) is excited to announce Austin/Travis County’s biannual Point in Time (PIT) Count will take place the night of January 25, 2025. With the announcement, ECHO is kicking off efforts to recruit at least 1,200 volunteers to make the one-night survey of people experiencing homelessness as successful as possible.

Anyone interested in volunteering for the 2025 PIT Count can sign up now to join the volunteer mailing list. As more details are finalized (start time, section map, formal volunteer registration form, etc.), ECHO will send the info to folks on the interest list. Signing up now ensures community members will have all the information they need to participate in the 2025 PIT Count.

The volunteer sign-up form is available at austinecho.org/pitcount. Updates will also be posted to that page. Points of contact for corporate or other volunteer groups are encouraged to sign up early so ECHO can provide any additional supports necessary.

In 2023, the last time our community conducted an in-person PIT Count, more than 700 volunteers showed up to survey people and pass out thousands of care kits containing socks, hygiene items, snacks, and other essentials. While not a precise census of people who are unhoused in our community, results from the survey help our community better understand who we’re serving, guide change in our Homelessness Response System (HRS), and highlight the impacts of policy changes. Read insights from the 2023 Count here.

About the PIT Count

Communities that receive funds from the federal Continuum of Care (CoC) Program are required to conduct a PIT Count of unsheltered people in the community every other year and a Count of sheltered individuals (conducted by accessing administrative data rather than individual surveys) every year. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) provides tools and general guidelines to conduct a successful Count, but it’s up to individual communities to decide how to facilitate the event based on what works for them. As the CoC Lead Agency for our community, ECHO is tasked with coordinating the Count. Learn more on HUD’s website.

Data is submitted to HUD in the months following the in-person Count. HUD staff then collect reports from communities across the country and combine them into the Annual Homeless Assessment Report (AHAR), which is presented to Congress each year to inform policy and funding discussions. Read the most recent AHAR here.