New Report: Hidden Homelessness in the Upper Peninsula
Rural Insights student researcher Max Steele recently published a new report on hidden homelessness in the Upper Peninsula–a problem that varies county-by-county and is a bigger issue than it often appears to be on the surface. Not only does it affect many adults in our region, it greatly affects children, too.
“The problem of homelessness, or poverty is not just in a far-off city such as Detroit or Milwaukee but in fact could be our friends, neighbors, or family. This situation that some find themselves in is significant and serious; there may not be actual federal or state resources to help them.”
You can read Max’s full paper on our website here: https://ruralinsights.org/content/publications/hidden-homelessness-in-the-upper-peninsula/
I’m sure the research is valuable, but the charts make no sense. Is the percent of kids in Marquette County on food assistance really less than 1/4th of 1%? Or should it be between 20 and 25%, which seems much more likely. But on the other hand, the “percent of kids under 5 homeless” for Alger County surely really is a fraction of a percent, not 11 percent. If the Alger County figure is really 11%, then that would make the Michigan figure on the chart 3%, which is completely inconsistent with the data I see, which says the total Michigan homeless population is 8 per 10,000. Percentages can also look more alarming than real numbers. If I’m doing my math right (not at all a sure thing), this comes down to between 5 and 6 children in Alger County. Certainly cause for concern, but perhaps not for panic. At any rate, this needs a lot more work.
This doesn’t seem to be academically rigorous, but rather a reflection of the author’s biases and beliefs. The emotional statements throughout the paper would never be published in a peer-reviewed journal as valid research.