In disheartening statistics from a recent Housing and Homeless Services Overview presented at the most recent County commission meeting, Dana Searcy, the Human Services Agency Division Director had recent statistics indicating that 52% of those who use county services for help have a disability, 42% are over the age of 55, and 29% lack insurance.
The report also indicated 14 percent of people receiving local help were unhoused before they came to the area, with most from other parts of Nevada or nearby California, leading to concerns of people being bused in to benefit from local services.
Studies indicate some cities have been offering unhoused people free bus tickets to relocate elsewhere for over three decades. This has been called “Greyhound therapy” or “homeless dumping” and is often associated with small towns and rural counties without their own services to help the unhoused.
“Specific to where people are coming from, we do collect information, but it’s left questions,” Searcy said. “We need to know not where someone is coming from, but were they homeless when they got here, and if so, where were they sent from? And that’s a very different question.”
Our Town Reno reporting, June 2025
