Homeless Statistics

The Scale of Homelessness Nationally...

Up to two million people will experience homelessness this year
Approximately one half of these people, 1.35 million will be children, according to the National Center on Family Homelessness
Most children living with a homeless parent are very young — 42% are under the age of six

Families with children are the fastest growing segment of the homeless population. They number 40% of the nation's homeless.

The National Center on Family Homelessness says that with the exception of the Great Depression, women and children have never been on the our nation's streets like they are today. www.familyhomelessness.org.

At the State Level...

The Chicago Coalition for the Homeless projected

80,000 Illinois citizens were homeless in 2005.
Of the 180,000 approximately 60,000 were children

The Institute for Children & Poverty reports the average homeless child in America is only 6 years old. www.homesforthehomeless.com

Locally...

In 2005, 43,000 were homeless in downstate Illinois, according to the Illinois Coalition to End Homelessness
The January 2006 count of the homeless in Springfield found 305 individuals without a place of their own. 137 of those were persons in families with children.