2024 broke records and made headlines for the surging number of people living on the streets of Central Florida, but one local non-profit announced they had a ‘record-breaking year’ saving people from homelessness.
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Leaders with the Christian Service Center announced the non-profit rescued 1,243 adults and children from homelessness in 2024, surpassing their goal for the year and breaking last year’s record.
It comes as the region has seen a 28 percent increase in homelessness according to the 2024, Point in Time Count, an annual census for homelessness across Orange, Osceola, and Seminole Counties.
According to the Executive Director of the Christian Service Center, Eric Gray, the local non-profit uses a color-coded chart to carefully track those lifted out of homelessness every year.
Gray told Channel 9 the non-profit has been doing this work for over 50-years but has become more efficient in stretching funding to help more families.
According to Gray, some people are provided transportation costs to be reunified with family other places, some are matched with housing funding, and some never become homeless to begin with because of the non-profit’s intervention.