Homelessness increases by 7% in Marion County in 2025

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The number of people experiencing homelessness in Indianapolis is climbing, up 7% from last year. That’s despite the city’s goal to make meaningful change by 2025.

“I just see it getting worse and worse,” Indianapolis native Reggie Johnson said.

I-Team 8 spoke with Johnson outside the City-County Building. It’s where he and many unhoused neighbors spend their days, fighting for a spot under the trees to avoid the heat.

He says he feels forgotten by people in power. “I’ve been put in a situation where I had to go to the mission, and all that, because I couldn’t afford the cost of living, because it’s too high.”

A total of 1,815 people in Marion County currently don’t have housing, according to new data from the Coalition for Homelessness Intervention and Prevention. It’s the highest tally since 2021. This year is also less than a hundred away from 2021’s number, which marked a 15-year high.

More than 1,000 of this year’s number identify as Black. That means about 56% of the county’s homeless residents are Black.

It’s a sobering statistic for the Rev. David W. Greene Sr. He’s the president of the Concerned Clergy of Indianapolis and helps oversee the Indianapolis Continuum of Care to help reduce homelessness. “It’s a clear indicator that we have a systemic problem, not just an individual issue or failure, but it’s really systemic that we all have to address. Looking at the root causes of homelessness, especially for Black people.”

A few years ago, the city announced an initiative specifically targeting ending homelessness for Black residents.

“We wanted, the goal was to reduce it by 35% and we were not able to do that,” Greene said. “I had hopes, when we started with that initiative, that we would see significant drops in it. But, that has not happened for a multiplicity of reasons.”

City leaders recently announced a new initiative aimed at ending homelessness in the city by 2028. Greene says leaders need to mean what they say.

“To demonstrate we’re trying to solve this problem,” Greene said. “We’re not just content to try to manage it, we’re saying we’re going to solve this.”

“They aren’t too much concerned about the homeless because if it was the case there would be other buildings in places like this right here, that they’re doing nothing with them where they can help house homeless people,” Johnson said.

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