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Austin homeless shelter has 20% success rate
Austin's homeless strategy office says the Marshalling Yard Shelter now has a positive outcome of 20 percent, up from 10 percent in January.
AUSTIN, Texas - Austin's homeless strategy office says the Marshalling Yard shelter now has a positive outcome rate of 20 percent, up from 10 percent in January.
That means more people leaving the shelter are improving their circumstances.
The shelter is also working with the Central Texas Food Bank to provide meals.
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Homeless crisis in South Austin neighborhood
The Sunrise Homeless Navigation Center is located in the heart of a South Austin neighborhood. Throughout the years, it has been at the center of the debate about how to address the homeless crisis in that area.
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However, during an Austin City Council discussion on Wednesday about the issue, there were concerns about the remaining 80 percent of people in the shelter who did not have positive outcomes.
"We have to be very judicious with our dollars. We are spending, in this case, a lot of money for a small number of people to ultimately get that positive outcome," District 5 council member Ryan Alter said. "The target that they provided as their performance metric for clients going into housing was 70 percent, and we're at 20. So to me, our vendor is not fulfilling what they said they were going to do within this contract."
In response, Austin homeless strategy officer David Gray said their success rate is trending with the rate nationwide, adding that part of their challenge is finding a place for people to go after leaving the shelter.