How we count, and what we leave out

What we count

Direct homelessness program spending, using published budgets, counted once where the money is spent:

• City of Sacramento: the Department of Community Response homelessness program budget from all funding sources, plus department staff.
• Sacramento County: the Department of Homeless Services and Housing (DHSH) total budget (before FY23/24, the Department of Human Assistance "Homeless and Community Services" program).
• State of California: counted inside the City or County budget that spends it. There is no separate State line, so State money is not counted twice.
• Federal (HUD Continuum of Care): shown on its own line. It goes straight to local groups and is never added to the City + County total.

The area covered is all of Sacramento County. Other cities in the county and SHRA's own budget are not included yet.

Technical definition used by the data pipeline: Direct homelessness program spending, budgeted basis, counted once where spent: City = DCR homelessness program budget (all funding sources) + DCR staff; County = DHSH gross appropriations (before FY23/24: DHA 'Homeless and Community Services'); State = counted inside City/County; Federal = HUD CoC awards to CA-503 (shown separately; trend line = City + County).

Counting rules

• Count each dollar once. When the County passes money to the City, or the City pays a provider, we count it where it is spent and mark the other steps as "counted elsewhere".
• Never mix kinds of numbers. Budgets, grant awards, HUD awards and checks paid overlap and are measured differently. They are shown side by side, never added.
• No guesses. If a number is not published, we list it as a gap and name the agency that holds it.
• Every number links to its source: the document, the page, the fiscal year and the date we downloaded it.
• Results are grouped by program type and shown with the population served. We do not rank programs of different types.

Budgeted vs actual

Totals on this site are budgets: what the City and County planned to spend when the budget was adopted. Actual spending can be higher or lower. The County prints actual spending for its department in later budget books; we keep it as a separate series and never mix it with budgets. The City does not publish actual spending by program. The City's open checkbook shows paper checks only, so we show it as a floor, not a total.

Fiscal years run July 1 to June 30. "FY25/26" means July 2025 to June 2026. HUD measures use the federal year (October to September), and some City results use calendar years.

One-time vs ongoing money

Many State grants are one-time. When one-time money ends, programs need a new source or they shrink. City headline money by type:

The County publishes one combined total, so its money is marked "mixed".

Confidence labels

• High: copied directly from a table in the source.
• Medium: from the source, but needed a judgment call (for example, which line belongs to homelessness).
• Low: derived, a short snapshot, or possibly a target rather than a result. Marked on the page.

Corrections

If a number here is wrong, we will fix it and list the change on this page with the date, the old value, the new value and the reason. No corrections have been published yet. A way to report errors will be added before launch.

Data downloads

• spending.csv: every line item with its source page
• totals_by_year.csv, totals_by_level.csv, totals_by_program_type.csv
• outcomes.csv and outcome_gaps.csv
• pass_through.csv and sources.csv

Sources (60)

What's next lists what we plan to add.