SAN MARCOS CITY COUNCIL
The San Marcos City Council received a presentation regarding the results of the 2025 Point In Time count for the population experiencing homelessness in San Marcos as counted on January 23. The number had decreased slightly from the PIT count in the previous year.
Reverend Joshua Sutherland, Hays County Homeless Coalition cochair, said the Point In Time count is required to receive U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development funding and measures unsheltered people as well as sheltered people that are in a shelter program or who have temporarily subsidized hotel stays. In 2025, there were 132 sheltered and 35 unsheltered people. In 2024, there were 111 sheltered and 99 unsheltered people. In 2023, there were 140 sheltered and 40 unsheltered people. In 2022, there were 105 sheltered and 68 unsheltered people.
Sutherland said, this year, there were more youth counted than older adults as well as a high concentration of people from 25 to 44 years of age. There were 38 sheltered children under five years old, seven sheltered from 13 to 17 years old, 10 sheltered and 3 unsheltered from 18 to 24 years old, 18 sheltered and 11 unsheltered from 25 to 34 years old, 17 sheltered and 21 unsheltered from 35 to 44 years old, eight sheltered and 11 unsheltered from 45 to 54 years old, eight sheltered and seven unsheltered from 55 to 64 years old, and four sheltered and two unsheltered that were 65 or older.
“The most likely to be homeless in turns of age group is zero to five years old,” Sutherland said. “Nationwide it’s true.”
In 2025, there were 25 sheltered and 25 unsheltered men, four trangender individuals, and 14 sheltered and 13 unsheltered women.
“As is true across the nation, men basically double the number of women that we have that are homeless in our community,” Sutherland said.
Sutherland said, in 2025, there were 35 sheltered and six unsheltered adult survivors of domestic violence, two sheltered and one unsheltered adults with HIV/AIDS, 12 sheltered and eight unsheltered adults with serious mental illness, three sheltered and one unsheltered adults with Substance Use Disorder, seven sheltered and 10 unsheltered chronically homeless individuals, and two sheltered and one unsheltered Veterans.
“One of the things that you are going to see that is abnormal, I think, in this community is that 44% of respondents identified as victims of domestic violence,” Sutherland said. “That is because of the Hays Caldwell Women’s Center. Most of the people that are experiencing domestic violence are living in the women’s shelter.”
Sutherland said there were four people in Buda, two in Kyle, two in Wimberley and 179 in San Marcos.
“132 are sheltered [in San Marcos], and all those shelter/transitional housing programs exist within San Marcos,” he said.
For the school districts, there are people considered “doubled up,” which are people that are living with others without enough beds or bedrooms. For San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District, the largest number of counted kids were doubled up at 56 from PreK to fifth grade, 17 from sixth to eighth grade and 15 from ninth to twelfth grade. There were 20 in a hotel/ motel, 29 in shelter/transitional housing and three unsheltered kids from Pre-K to fifth grade. There were six in a hotel/motel and nine in shelter/transitional housing from sixth to eighth grade. There were three in a hotel/motel and three unsheltered from ninth to twelfth grade.
“We were the only school district that reported children unsheltered … in terms of the county,” Sutherland said.
He pointed out that there are varying numbers of people for some of the demographic data as compared to the total number counted because some people did not want to answer all of the questions.
