On Friday, the Maricopa Association of Governments released data from its annual one-day count of unhoused people in the Phoenix metropolitan area, known as the Point in Time count. The PIT count is meant to give a snapshot of homelessness in the Valley, provide more details about the unhoused community’s demographics and allow local governments to apply for funding from federal homeless assistance programs.
The count was conducted on Jan. 28, during which officials and volunteers counted 9,734 people experiencing homelessness across the Valley. That’s a 3% increase from 2024, when the count found 9,435 unhoused people, a year-over-year decrease. The 2025 total is also roughly 100 people more than the 2023 total, meaning the Valley completely reversed any gains it made last year.
That’s concerning, but not the most concerning thing the count uncovered. Last year, for the first time since the PIT count began, there were far more unhoused people who were sheltered — essentially, who had a roofed place to rest their heads at night — than who were unsheltered.
This year, though, those ratios reversed themselves, with the number of unsheltered people jumping 28%. While there were a little more than 4,000 unsheltered people in 2024, there were close to 5,000 this year.
That suggests the progress made in 2024 was an aberration. Brian Gruters, the regional homelessness program manager for MAG who led the PIT count, noted that the 2025 numbers are very much in line with preceding years, last year excepted.
“If you took 2024 out, this year’s count wouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone,” Gruters said in a phone interview with Phoenix New Times. “We just had a really good year in 2024, and last year we didn't."
Why was the Valley’s progress erased? In a press release, Phoenix Office of Homeless Solutions director Rachel Milne pointed to the expiration of federal funding — specifically, funding from the Joe Biden-backed American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. As a result, 1,000 shelter beds are no longer in use in the Valley, a number that closely mirrors the increase in unsheltered people in the PIT count.
“Those funds did a lot for our community: they helped us design new ways to house and serve our unsheltered neighbors; they provided supportive services for seniors, families, and individuals to help end their homelessness; and they allowed us to increase the number of shelter beds available to provide a safe, indoor space for thousands of people in need,” Milne wrote. “We will continue to seek local, state, and federal funding to ensure that we can help prevent and end homelessness in our community.”
Worse ahead?
Though the count technically took place during the early days of President Donald Trump’s administration, any cuts Trump made in his first week in office wouldn’t have affected the conditions on the ground that quickly. But that doesn’t mean they won’t affect things going forward.Gruters and other officials suspect things could get worse with the Trump administration looking to scale back government spending.
“I think that's got everybody a little bit concerned about what we might see down the line,” Gruters said. "The number of resources, like shelters, has been declining. And that's a major concern."
The problem is likely worse than the PIT count total even suggests. The nonpartisan think tank Grand Canyon Institute believes that, by nature, the PIT count is vulnerable to chronic undercounting.
Dave Wells, the institute’s research director and an advocate for the unhoused, told New Times that GCI surveyed people the day of the count at an Aris Foundation meal for the homeless. The institute found that most of the people who said they slept on the street had not been counted. While the official count found 306 unsheltered people in Tempe — the second-most behind Phoenix — Wells and GCI estimate the real number may be more than 700 people.
“Unsheltered people are systematically undercounted by the Point in Time survey,” the institute wrote in a policy brief. “The Point in Time survey does tell us a great deal about the people who were surveyed as many important questions are asked. We just should not expect that the ‘census’ is accurate, especially as it relates to people who are ‘unsheltered.’"
That conclusion doesn’t surprise Gruters. The count cannot be 100% accurate. It’s a best guess.
"It's an imperfect database,” Gruters said. “By definition, it's a point in time rather than a comprehensive look at the flow of people in and out of homelessness. We tend to look at the PIT count as a minimum count. We can't get everyone in one day."
Undercounting or not, the number of unhoused people has gone up, and that’s an especially troubling trend as the summer approaches. The last two summers in the Valley have seen an unsettling spike in heat-related deaths, with 1,253 people dying from heat-related causes over those two years. About half of those who died were living on the streets.
Now, those people may have fewer places to go. The Valley lost 1,000 shelter beds, and Tempe changed the rules it uses to approve cooling centers, denying approval to several that operated last year and therefore giving unhoused residents fewer places to seek refuge from the heat. On top of that, this summer is forecasted to be hotter than normal, though perhaps not as hot as the last two record-breaking years.
“We could have a lot more than 600 people perish this summer,” Wells said.
A map of the Valley’s cooling centers — in some cases, the absolute last barrier keeping the unhoused from death in extreme heat — can be found on MAG’s website.