By Bobby Nichols | Tempe
OPINION — Over the last decade, Tempe’s unhoused population has grown from 24 to 277, peaking at 515 in the summer of 2022.
Source: Maricopa Association of Governments
Rampant evictions and rising rents have caused increases in homelessness around the country, but Tempe’s increase is the largest of any city in Maricopa County that had at least 20 unhoused residents in 2015. Avondale’s unhoused population grew by 310% in the same time frame, Chandler’s by 441%, Glendale’s by 676%, Peoria’s by 316%, Phoenix’s by 378% and Mesa’s by 167%.
Tempe’s increase from 24 to 277 represents an increase of 1,154%. That is unacceptable, and it may be significantly worse than we have been asked to believe.
As a method of measuring homelessness, Tempe’s point-in-time counts are flawed at best. Field research by the Grand Canyon Institute recently found that only 27% of unhoused Tempe residents who attended a high traffic mutual aid event on the day of the January 2025 point-in-time count had actually been counted.
Even if we assume that the count is 100% accurate, Tempe’s unhoused population has exploded over the last 10 years, and Tempe’s costly efforts to solve the problem have resulted in minimal improvements.
As a result of the 2022 River Bottom Sweep, which officially began in June, more than 100 unhoused Tempe residents were pushed from relatively stable shelter into Tempe’s parks and streets. This is reflected by a spike in the point-in-time count between January 2022 and July 2022, from 384 to 515.
City employees tasked with managing this sudden explosion of unsheltered residents admitted that Tempe did not have enough shelter beds or permanent supportive housing units to provide for the displaced community. Many took shelter in neighboring cities and camped in parks, where they faced harassment and mental health crises, resulting in increased rates of addiction and arrest.
Tempe proudly declares that it spent $137 million on “homelessness” between July 2022 and July 2025, decreasing our unhoused population by 46%, from 515 to 277. The city presents this statistic as positive, but it means that Tempe has spent $575,000 on each person permanently removed from our unhoused population. If we use the January 2022 pre-sweep population of 384 instead of 515, that cost explodes to more than $1 million per person.
That is inefficient at best and irresponsible at worst. At the current cost of constructing apartments, Tempe could have saved $40 million by building 600 studio units on public land. That’s more than enough for every single unhoused person who lived in Tempe as of July 2022.
Studies consistently show that the solution to homelessness is housing. Strategies built on criminalization and surveillance are just expensive failures.
If Tempe wants to end homelessness, we need new leaders with proven plans. It isn’t radical to stop wasteful spending and adopt the housing first policy; it’s simple common sense.
With a budget crisis looming and eviction rates hitting record highs in 2024 and 2025, the time for change is now.
Bobby Nichols is a candidate for Tempe City Council. Please submit comments at yourvalley.net/letters or email them to AzOpinions@iniusa.org. We are committed to publishing a wide variety of reader opinions, as long as they meet our Civility Guidelines.