On a freezing Thursday night in late January, as most Savannah residents were deciding whether to drip their faucets, nearly 90 volunteers set out across the city to find and count its unhoused citizens.
The annual Point-in-Time (PIT) count is part of a nationwide effort to provide a real-time survey of people experiencing homelessness on a single night. The data provides a snapshot of both sheltered and unsheltered individuals in the community. It’s organized locally by the Chatham-Savannah Authority for the Homeless (CSAH).
Armed with headlamps, reflective vests, and a survey app, volunteers split into eight teams to search the shadows of Savannah’s streets, parking lots, and wooded areas where people live unseen.
For most volunteers, it was a one-night mission. For Chris Wilson, it was a walk through his own past. Wilson, now an Outreach Case Manager with CSAH, spent five years experiencing homelessness in the area before finding a path to recovery.
Wilson now uses that experience to bridge the gap between people experiencing homelessness, who often feel invisible, and the rest of the city. “I refuse to harden my heart or put those calluses there that stop me from being compassionate toward human beings,” Wilson said.
Teams conducting surveys with willing participants asked for basic personal information, where they slept that night, how long they had been without housing, and whether they were experiencing any health issues.
The night’s bitter temperatures hovered around 30 and left many streets unusually empty. People sought refuge in one of the area’s seven night shelters or temporary warming centers, all of which were included in the night’s count, Wilson said. Volunteers also searched for those considered “service-resistant,” people who choose to remain outside despite available shelter.
“You’re meeting people where they are,” said Karen Guinn, the authority’s board chair and one of the evening’s volunteers. “Some have very complex conditions, substance use disorder, severe mental illness, and trauma, so you kind of go into it with empathy and understanding. People are suffering.”
The collected data is submitted to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which then reports its findings in the Annual Homeless Assessment Report to Congress. The information informs federal, state, and local organizations on how to allocate resources. To receive federal funds, HUD requires communities to conduct an annual PIT count.
Data from previous years indicates that while the population of people experiencing homelessness in Savannah rose from 579 in 2024 to 628 in 2025, the number of people living unsheltered decreased. This suggests that coordinated efforts, such as improved access to emergency shelter beds and Permanent Supportive Housing (PSH), have been effective. The number of recorded encampments in Chatham County also dropped from 80 in 2023 to 39 in 2025.
“We’re about consistent, persistent re-engagement,” Wilson said. “The ultimate goal is to put a roof over everyone’s head, but we can’t start there. We have to get people reconnected to services.”
This article appears in Coastal Lens.
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