The New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services reports that despite the struggling economy, the state’s made progress in reducing its homeless population.
The department’s one-day census, conducted on January 30, counted 2,600 homeless people based on information from shelters, soup kitchens and food pantries.
That’s a slight drop from the 2007 count.
Last year’s count officially came to 1,300 but didn’t include the nearly 1,000 homeless people in Merrimack and Nashua or the 500 people who are “couch surfing” or doubled up and don’t have a permanent residence. That would have brought the total number of homeless to 2,800.
State officials acknowledged that the count doesn’t capture all of the homeless, like those living in the woods in Salem, because that community doesn’t have shelters.