Contra Costa County achieved a remarkable 26% reduction in homelessness between 2024 and 2025, bucking the trend seen across most of the Bay Area where homeless populations have continued to surge. The county's annual point-in-time count, conducted on January 30, identified 2,118 people experiencing homelessness—725 fewer than the previous year's count of 2,843, according to Contra Costa Health.
County Stands Out Against Regional Increases
The decline stands in sharp contrast to broader Bay Area trends, where homelessness increased 6% to an estimated 38,891 people in 2024, data from East Bay Times shows. While most neighboring counties saw significant increases—San Francisco jumped from 7,582 to 8,323 people and Santa Clara County reached a record 10,711—only three Bay Area counties managed to reduce their homeless populations. Marin County decreased by 2.8% to 1,090 people, Marin Independent Journal found, while Napa County saw a drop from 506 to 414.
The success comes despite the Bay Area's homeless population growing 46% over the past decade to more than 38,000, Mercury News reported, reflecting what advocates describe as an ongoing crisis fueled by housing affordability challenges and insufficient resources.
Significant Improvements Across All County Regions
The reductions were widespread throughout Contra Costa County, with all three regions showing substantial improvements. West County saw a 41% decrease, Central County dropped 33%, and East County fell 41%. Some cities experienced particularly dramatic improvements: Martinez saw a 60% reduction, Richmond declined 46%, and Antioch dropped 40%.
Antioch, which had the largest unsheltered population in 2024 at 413 people, saw that number fall to 236 this year, figures from East Bay Times reveal. Richmond's unsheltered population dropped from 388 to 208, while Concord's declined from 173 to 131.
Expanded Housing and Services Drive Success
County officials credit the dramatic improvement to a 34% increase in temporary and permanent housing beds since 2023, along with expanded rental assistance programs. The county's Health, Housing & Homeless Services (H3) division has worked with community partners to open new facilities, including El Portal Place, which began welcoming residents in October 2024, ContraCosta.news noted.
El Portal Place, located at 2555 El Portal Drive in San Pablo, transformed a vacant office building into 54 micro-unit apartments for homeless adults with disabilities, research by Local News Matters shows. The $21.2 million project received $16 million from California's Homekey program and $5.2 million from Contra Costa's Measure X sales tax.
"Not saying we've solved homelessness, but we have seen a significant decrease," Christy Saxton, director of Contra Costa Health's H3 division, told the Board of Supervisors when the results were presented, according to East Bay Times. This represents the county's second Homekey facility, following Delta Landing, a 172-unit interim housing site in Pittsburg that opened in 2022, Contra Costa Health confirmed.
street_address:2555 El Portal Drive, San Pablo
Demographics and Ongoing Challenges
The count revealed persistent demographic disparities, with 34% of homeless residents being Black despite that racial group making up only 9% of the county's total population, analysis by Times Herald found. About 36% of unhoused people are White, 14% are Latino, 6% are multiracial, and 5% are Native American.
The majority of those experiencing homelessness—59%—are between ages 25 and 54, while 28% are 55 and older. Notably, 72% had lived in Contra Costa County for 10 or more years, data compiled by Local News Matters indicates, contradicting common misconceptions about people traveling to the area for services.
Survey responses revealed the harsh realities faced by those experiencing homelessness: 75% said they lost belongings when forced to move, while 63% reported being made to move by police or city workers, NBC Bay Area stated. Additionally, 86% of households surveyed said at least one member suffered from a disabling condition.
Funding Concerns Threaten Future Progress
Despite the encouraging results, county officials warn that progress could be short-lived due to looming budget cuts at both state and federal levels. Governor Gavin Newsom signed a state budget that allocated only half the amount set aside last year to help local governments combat homelessness, CalMatters disclosed, while the Legislature proposed adding just $500 million back into the state homeless funding program for the 2026-27 fiscal year—still a 50% reduction from previous allocations.
At the federal level, President Donald Trump has proposed massive cuts to homelessness programs and housing vouchers, including slashing Housing and Urban Development funding by 44% and eliminating the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, as reported by CalMatters.
"It's extremely frustrating," San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan told CalMatters, expressing concerns shared by municipal leaders across the state. "Residents of California tell us consistently that ending unsheltered homelessness is one of their very top priorities."
Regional Context and Collaborative Approach
The success comes amid a broader regional struggle with homelessness, where the Bay Area arrived at this crisis through more than a generation of housing and homelessness policy failures at all levels of government, research from Bay Area Council Economic Institute shows. High construction costs make traditional interventions extremely expensive—the average unit of new or rehabilitated affordable housing in the Bay Area costs over $529,000, statistics from Bay Area Council Economic Institute reveal.
Contra Costa's approach has emphasized coordination between multiple agencies and jurisdictions. The county's Continuum of Care unites over 50 organizations, cities, towns and individuals with a shared mission to prevent and end homelessness, Contra Costa Health indicated, while the H3 division integrates services across the county's health system.
The county's Coordinated Outreach, Referral, Engagement (C.O.R.E.) program works to engage and stabilize homeless individuals living outside through consistent outreach, according to Contra Costa Health, serving as an entry point into the coordinated entry system for unsheltered persons.
A Bright Spot Amid Broader Challenges
While challenges remain—60% of homeless individuals in the county still lack shelter beds—the results offer hope in a region where homelessness has been described as an "ongoing crisis" by researchers and advocates, Mercury News determined. The county's progress also coincided with a reduction in homeless deaths, which fell from 113 in 2023 to 76 in 2024, Local News Matters revealed.
The timing of reporting these results takes on additional significance as state and local governments grapple with reduced funding for homelessness programs. Contra Costa County's success demonstrates that coordinated efforts combining housing development, services expansion, and regional collaboration can produce measurable results—providing a potential model as communities across California face similar fiscal constraints while confronting one of the state's most persistent challenges.
