{"id":359477,"date":"2026-07-03T03:13:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T03:13:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/359477\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T03:13:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T03:13:13","slug":"austin-unlikely-to-open-its-new-homeless-shelter-by-self-set-september-deadline-austin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/359477\/","title":{"rendered":"Austin unlikely to open its new homeless shelter by self-set September deadline | Austin"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the number of Austinites living without a roof over their head continues to increase, the city\u2019s elected leaders in January committed to opening an emergency homeless shelter by the end of September<\/a>; however, officials say plans have since changed.
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\nAustin\u2019s homeless population has fluctuated since 2010, according to the results of point-in-time counts\u2014a manual census of Austin\u2019s homeless, conducted on a single night each January by the Ending Community Homelessness Coalition. The 2019 count showed 2,255 individuals experiencing homelessness, 1,086 of whom were unsheltered. The unsheltered population has grown 142% since 2014.
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\nAddressing homelessness has been propped as the community\u2019s top priority. After consistent criticism from the community for a lack of resources, City Council in January voted to overhaul its efforts. Council changed its strategy at the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless\u2014the lone city-run homeless shelter located downtown\u2014from an emergency shelter that turned over each morning to a facility focusing on connecting clients to case management. Since the change at the ARCH\u2014expected to take full effect by fall\u2014would result in a capacity reduction of 60 beds, City Council unanimously resolved to construct a new emergency shelter and \u201cmake the structure and services available for use on or before Sept. 30.\u201d The new facility would be the first expansion of city-run shelter space since the ARCH opened in 2004.
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\nHowever, the city will likely miss the Sept. 30 deadline, in part, because the new facility will not be an emergency shelter,\u00a0 District 5 Council Member Ann Kitchen said.
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\n\u201cThe actual opening date probably isn\u2019t going to be by the first of October,\u201d said Kitchen, who spearheaded the commitment in January. \u201cThe recommendation from staff has been to instead go with an actual housing-focused shelter. That does take longer [to produce], but it appears to be a better investment for the city to make.\u201d
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\nKitchen said that instead of the emergency shelter model, the new shelter would operate under the same mission as the modern ARCH\u2014connecting 100% of the clients to case management and permanent supportive housing. The strategy aligns with the city’s new housing-first philosophy in addressing homelessness.
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\nAccording to city documents, the city has identified a property for the new shelter, although its location remains under wraps as the negotiation process continues. Kitchen will bring a resolution June 6, directing city staff to move on purchasing the property. In consultation with the National Alliance to End Homelessness, city staff has recommended the shelter have 100 beds and low barriers to entry.
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\nIt would cost roughly $2.5 million annually to run such a shelter, according to staff estimates presented to council June 4.
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\nAustin has also been trying to hire a homelessness strategy officer since January; however, city executives said they have been displeased with the candidate pool. Assistant City Manager Rodney Gonzalez said the application process closed out last week, and the recruiter is parsing through a new pool of candidates. Gonzalez said he thinks the position will be closed out in July.
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\nMayor Steve Adler said he thinks the entire community is focused on addressing homelessness, but he said the people of the city are also \u201creally, really confused\u201d because the issue seems to be growing much larger, as the homeless individuals are more visible than they once were. During the June 4 work session, Adler maintained it was the community\u2019s top priority and ensured the city was working hard to make progress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the number of Austinites living without a roof over their head continues to increase, the city\u2019s elected…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357789,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,127726],"class_list":["post-359477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-austin-unlikely-to-open-its-new-homeless-shelter-by-self-set-september-deadline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=359477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359477\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=359477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=359477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=359477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}