More cowbell, fewer unhoused: Point-in-time homeless count brings goal slightly more into focus

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) – They have a tradition at the Brundage Lane Navigation Center: Graduates get a parade.
Not the traditional kind. No baton twirlers, no trombones. It's more like a gauntlet of joy, with employees and fellow navigation center residents sending off a fellow homeless center resident to the world of the housed with hoots and cheers. The closest thing to a musical instrument? Cowbell.
Mosquito sample tests positive for West Nile virus in Kern County
And Navigation Center manager Theo Dues wants more cowbell.
'We're gonna continue to do this work until we see this crisis resolved,' Dues told KGET on a recent tour of the Brundage Lane facility, managed by Mercy House in collaboration with the City of Bakersfield. 'We truly believe that homelessness is a problem that we can solve. Now just manage. That we can actually solve.'
What's the holdup? Primarily this: The availability of affordable housing. California has a shortage. There are signs things are improving. Then there's this positive trend.
The Bakersfield-Kern Regional Homeless Collaborative's new point-in-time homeless count reveals a decline in the number of unhoused in Kern County. Not a huge decline – just 2.3 percent from last year's count – but a decline nonetheless.
The annual count is required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The collected data is used by state and federal governments to determine funding for counties, cities, and local continuums of care, so it's important – important to know not just how many, but who and from what backgrounds.
'Now, within this count and every count, every demographic is represented,' said Lauren Skidmore of the Open Door Network, which runs the Bakersfield Homeless Center. 'There is a very diverse population of homeless individuals.'
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The 2025 Count revealed 2,606 people experiencing homelessness, including 1,393 who are unsheltered and 1,213 individuals who have utilized shelters. This is not an exact science, but it's one of the few tools we have. Counting the number of people living in shelters is one thing, but counting those on the street is quite another.
And officials with the collaborative say their ability to gather data that can be trusted is at an all-time high – not just because they continue to tweak their techniques, but because they continue to see buy-in from the broader community. 358 volunteers participated in the three-day count, the third straight year of high volunteer participation. That, combined with a more sophisticated counting process and progress in the creation of affordable housing means the likelihood of more navigation center graduation parades.
Because we got to have more cowbell.
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