Chapter 16: Housing and Homelessness Mapping

Chapter Overview

Housing is fundamental community infrastructure. Without stable, safe, affordable housing, people cannot access employment, education, healthcare, or social participation. This chapter examines how to map housing systems: affordability, rental supply, short-term rental impacts, homelessness (visible and hidden), supportive housing, shelter access, and encampments. It addresses the central ethical tension in homelessness mapping: maps can support outreach, resource delivery, and harm reduction — or they can enable surveillance, eviction, and harm. Consent, community authority, and the commitment to do no harm are non-negotiable.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this chapter, you will be able to:

Explain housing as community infrastructure and identify the components of a housing system
Map housing affordability and identify neighborhoods where housing cost burdens are highest
Analyze rental supply and the impact of short-term rentals on housing availability
Define hidden homelessness and explain why it outnumbers visible street homelessness in most communities
Articulate the ethical framework for mapping homelessness, encampments, and vulnerable populations
Apply the consent and harm-reduction principles that govern when and how to map sensitive housing situations
Recognize policy and planning leverage points within housing systems

Key Terms

Housing Affordability: The relationship between housing costs (rent or mortgage) and household income. Housing is typically considered affordable if it costs no more than 30% of gross household income.
Hidden Homelessness: People experiencing homelessness by staying temporarily with friends, family, or acquaintances (couch-surfing), living in vehicles, motels, or other precarious arrangements — not visible in shelters or on the streets.
Supportive Housing: Housing that combines affordable, stable accommodation with integrated support services (mental health, addiction treatment, life skills, employment support) for people with complex needs.
Housing First: An evidence-based approach that provides immediate access to permanent housing without preconditions (sobriety, treatment compliance), with voluntary supports available. Originated with Pathways to Housing (Sam Tsemberis, 1992).

16.1 Housing as Community Infrastructure

Housing is not just a private good — it is community infrastructure. Like roads, water systems, and schools, housing shapes who can live in a community, where they can work, how they access services, and whether they can participate in community life.

Housing stability affects everything. Children in stable housing attend school more consistently and perform better academically. Adults in stable housing have better health outcomes, higher employment rates, and stronger social connections. Seniors in stable housing age in place with dignity. Communities with diverse, affordable housing are more resilient, equitable, and inclusive.

A housing system includes multiple components: ownership housing (single-family, condos), rental housing (market, below-market, social housing), supportive housing, transitional housing, emergency shelters, and temporary accommodations. It also includes the policies, regulations, and funding mechanisms that shape supply, cost, and access: zoning, building codes, tenant protections, subsidies, and land use planning.

Housing systems are shaped by markets, but they are not purely market phenomena. Government policy, historical discrimination, land speculation, financialization, and power structures determine who has access to housing and who is excluded. Redlining — the historical practice of denying mortgages to racialized communities — still shapes housing patterns today. Restrictive zoning that limits density and affordable housing protects property values for homeowners while pricing out renters and low-income families.

Community Mapping of housing systems reveals these patterns. It shows where housing is affordable and where it is not. It shows who is served by the current system and who is left out. It identifies neighborhoods at risk of displacement due to gentrification or redevelopment. It documents the hidden forms of housing insecurity that official counts miss.

Housing mapping is politically charged. Property owners may resist mapping that reveals affordability crises or the impact of investor-driven development. Municipalities may resist mapping that documents policy failures. Mapping housing requires transparency about whose interests are being served and whose are being challenged.

16.2 Housing Affordability

Housing affordability is the relationship between housing cost and household income. The widely used threshold is that housing should cost no more than 30% of gross household income. Households paying more are considered "cost-burdened." Those paying more than 50% are "severely cost-burdened."

Cost burden is not just about high rents. It is about the mismatch between housing costs and local incomes. A city with high rents and high wages may have better affordability than a small town with low rents and lower wages. Affordability mapping must account for both sides of the equation.

Data sources for affordability mapping include census data (household income, housing costs), rental market surveys, and real estate listings. Canadian census data provides neighborhood-level data on median household income, median rent, and the percentage of households spending 30% or more on housing. This allows for fine-grained geographic analysis.

Affordability mapping reveals where cost burdens are highest. In many Canadian cities, affordability crises are concentrated in specific neighborhoods: downtown cores with high rents, suburban areas with low transit access and high transportation costs, and rural communities with limited rental supply and stagnant wages.

Affordability mapping also reveals who is most affected. Renters face higher cost burdens than homeowners. Single parents, seniors on fixed incomes, newcomers, and people with disabilities are disproportionately cost-burdened. Mapping that overlays affordability data with demographic data reveals these disparities.

But affordability is not just about numbers. A household paying 35% of income on rent may be cost-burdened by the official definition, but if the housing is safe, stable, and well-located, the impact may be manageable. A household paying 28% on rent may technically be affordable, but if the unit is overcrowded, unsafe, or far from work and services, the real burden is higher. Affordability mapping should be triangulated with qualitative data about housing quality, stability, and location.

Affordability crises drive displacement. When rents rise faster than incomes, long-time residents are pushed out. Gentrification — the process by which higher-income residents move into historically lower-income neighborhoods, driving up costs — is a key driver of displacement. Mapping gentrification risk involves tracking rent increases, demographic shifts, business turnover, and rezoning activity.

Municipalities use affordability mapping to inform inclusionary zoning policies, affordable housing targets, and rental assistance programs. Advocates use affordability mapping to document crises and push for tenant protections, rent control, and public investment in social housing.

16.3 Rental Supply

Rental housing is a critical component of the housing system. In many Canadian cities, 30-50% of households rent. Renters are more likely to be young, low-income, newcomers, or single-person households. Rental housing provides flexibility, accessibility, and an entry point for people who cannot afford ownership.

But rental supply is under pressure. In many cities, rental construction has not kept pace with demand. Purpose-built rental buildings — buildings designed and maintained as rental housing — have declined as a share of total housing stock. Many older rental buildings have been converted to condos or demolished for redevelopment. The result is low vacancy rates, rising rents, and intense competition for available units.

Mapping rental supply involves identifying where rental housing is located, what type it is (purpose-built, secondary suites, condo rentals), and how supply is changing over time. Data sources include municipal property databases, rental market reports from CMHC (Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation), and building permit data.

Rental supply mapping reveals geographic disparities. Some neighborhoods have abundant rental housing. Others have almost none — often due to zoning that prohibits multi-unit buildings or restricts secondary suites. Mapping these patterns supports policy advocacy for zoning reform, gentle density, and rental housing incentives.

Rental supply mapping also tracks loss. When a rental building is demolished, converted to condos, or renovated with significant rent increases (renovictions), the loss reduces supply and displaces existing tenants. Tracking these losses over time reveals the scale of the problem and identifies neighborhoods at risk.

In some markets, rental housing is being financialized — purchased by investment firms and real estate trusts as an asset class. These corporate landlords may prioritize short-term returns over long-term affordability and tenant stability. Mapping ownership patterns — identifying which buildings are owned by large corporate landlords versus small local landlords or nonprofits — can inform tenant organizing, policy advocacy, and public acquisition strategies.

16.4 Short-Term Rentals

Short-term rental platforms like Airbnb have transformed housing markets. In tourist destinations, university towns, and high-demand urban cores, entire rental units have been converted to short-term rentals. The impact on housing supply and affordability is real, hyperlocal, and politically contested.

When a long-term rental unit is converted to a short-term rental, it is removed from the housing supply. A unit that could house a resident year-round instead houses tourists for nights or weeks at a time. In neighborhoods with tight rental markets, this conversion exacerbates scarcity and drives up rents.

Short-term rental impacts are geographically concentrated. In Toronto's downtown core, some buildings have 20-30% of units listed on Airbnb. In Halifax's North End, short-term rentals proliferated in neighborhoods that previously had affordable rental stock. In Vancouver, Whistler, and Tofino, tourist-driven short-term rentals have hollowed out housing for workers and long-term residents.

Mapping short-term rentals involves scraping data from platforms (though platforms resist transparency), cross-referencing property addresses, and analyzing listing patterns. Researchers and advocacy groups in Toronto, Vancouver, and Halifax have produced maps showing the concentration of short-term rentals, the loss of housing supply, and the correlation with rising rents.

These maps have informed policy. Cities have introduced regulations limiting short-term rentals: requiring hosts to live in the unit (primary residence rule), capping the number of nights per year, or banning short-term rentals in certain zones. Enforcement requires data — and maps showing where violations are concentrated support enforcement prioritization.

Short-term rental mapping is contested. The platform industry argues that most hosts are residents renting out spare rooms to make ends meet. Advocates argue that a significant share of listings are commercial operators running multiple units. Mapping that distinguishes between single-listing hosts and multi-listing operators (likely commercial) clarifies the debate.

But short-term rentals are not uniformly harmful. In rural and remote areas with limited hotel infrastructure, short-term rentals support tourism and local economies. In some contexts, short-term rentals allow homeowners to avoid foreclosure or fund home maintenance. Mapping should avoid blanket condemnation and instead identify where impacts are most severe and where regulation is most needed.

16.5 Homelessness and Hidden Homelessness

Homelessness is the most visible manifestation of housing system failure. But what we see — people sleeping rough on streets, in parks, or in encampments — is only part of the picture. Hidden homelessness is far larger.

The Canadian Definition of Homelessness, developed by the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness (a real research institute based at York University), identifies four categories:

Unsheltered (street homelessness): People sleeping outside, in parks, vehicles, abandoned buildings, or other places not intended for human habitation.
Emergency sheltered: People staying in overnight shelters for people experiencing homelessness.
Provisionally accommodated: People in transitional housing, institutions (hospitals, corrections), or temporary accommodations (motels, couch-surfing, staying with friends/family without security of tenure).
At risk of homelessness: People in housing but at immediate risk of losing it due to eviction, unaffordability, unsafe conditions, or violence.

Hidden homelessness — the provisionally accommodated — outnumbers visible street homelessness by a significant margin in most communities. People couch-surfing, doubled-up with family, living in vehicles, or staying in motels week-to-week are experiencing homelessness, but they are not counted in Point-in-Time Counts (the standardized street and shelter counts conducted by municipalities). They are invisible to service systems, to policy-makers, and often to their own communities.

Youth homelessness is disproportionately hidden. Youth experiencing homelessness rarely sleep on the streets — they couch-surf, stay with older partners, trade survival sex for shelter, or hide in places where they won't be identified. Women fleeing domestic violence may stay in precarious situations rather than enter shelters. Indigenous people experiencing homelessness may avoid shelters due to discrimination, cultural alienation, or fear of child welfare involvement.

Mapping hidden homelessness is methodologically difficult. Census data undercounts it. Shelter data misses it. Point-in-Time Counts miss it. The best approaches involve qualitative research: interviews with service providers who work with couch-surfing youth, surveys at food banks and drop-in centers, and outreach to communities most affected.

Mapping homelessness — visible or hidden — must be done with extreme care. A map showing where people experiencing homelessness are located can support outreach, service delivery, and harm reduction. It can also enable surveillance, harassment, and eviction. This ethical tension is addressed in Section 16.8.

16.6 Supportive Housing

Supportive housing is a model that combines affordable, stable accommodation with integrated support services: mental health care, addiction treatment, life skills training, employment support, and case management. It is designed for people with complex needs who have experienced chronic homelessness, mental illness, addiction, or trauma.

Supportive housing is distinct from shelters (which are temporary and offer minimal support), transitional housing (which is time-limited), and affordable housing (which offers housing but not integrated supports). Supportive housing is permanent, with no time limits. Supports are voluntary — residents can access as much or as little as they need.

The Housing First model, developed by Pathways to Housing (founded by Sam Tsemberis in 1992 in New York), is the evidence-based approach underpinning supportive housing. Housing First provides immediate access to permanent housing without preconditions: no requirement to be sober, no requirement to complete treatment, no requirement to "prove readiness." Once housed, residents are offered supports — but participation is voluntary.

Housing First has been rigorously evaluated. Studies show it improves housing stability, reduces emergency room visits and hospitalizations, reduces criminal justice involvement, and improves quality of life. It is also cost-effective: the cost of supportive housing is lower than the combined cost of emergency shelters, hospitals, jails, and police contact that people cycling through homelessness experience.

Mapping supportive housing involves identifying where supportive housing units are located, what populations they serve, how many units exist, and where gaps remain. Data sources include municipal housing departments, nonprofit housing providers, and provincial/federal housing databases.

Supportive housing mapping reveals supply gaps. In many cities, there are waiting lists of hundreds or thousands for supportive housing units. Mapping shows where supply is concentrated (often downtown) and where it is absent (often suburbs, small towns, and rural areas). It shows which populations are served (single adults, families, youth, Indigenous people, people with specific needs) and which are underserved.

Supportive housing is politically contested. Communities sometimes resist new supportive housing developments — a phenomenon known as NIMBYism (Not In My Back Yard). Mapping that documents the positive impacts of existing supportive housing (crime reduction, neighborhood stability, resident wellbeing) can counter stigma and support new developments.

16.7 Shelter Access

Emergency shelters are the safety net for people experiencing homelessness. But shelter systems are often overburdened, underfunded, and inaccessible to many who need them.

Shelter access mapping involves documenting where shelters are located, their capacity, occupancy rates, populations served (men, women, families, youth), and barriers to access (intake requirements, waitlists, hours of operation, transportation).

Shelter mapping reveals geographic gaps. In many cities, shelters are concentrated downtown. Suburban and rural areas may have no shelters at all. This means that people experiencing homelessness in those areas either go unsheltered or must travel long distances — often without transportation or resources.

Shelter mapping also reveals service gaps. Many shelters exclude specific populations: men-only or women-only shelters exclude non-binary people; family shelters may not accommodate older youth; pet-friendly shelters are rare. Some shelters have intake restrictions: sobriety requirements, curfews, or bans on people with certain criminal histories. These restrictions exclude the most vulnerable.

Shelter occupancy data shows system strain. When shelters operate at or above capacity, people are turned away. Overflow protocols — temporary mats in community centers, emergency motel vouchers — are stopgaps, not solutions. Mapping occupancy over time shows seasonal patterns (higher in winter), trends (increasing demand, static supply), and crisis points (extreme weather events, public health emergencies).

Shelter mapping should include service pathways: how people access shelters (referral systems, walk-in, outreach), what supports are available (case management, health services, meals, clothing), and where people go when they leave (return to homelessness, move to transitional housing, secure permanent housing). Mapping these pathways reveals bottlenecks, gaps, and opportunities for system improvement.

But shelter mapping must be done with consent and care. Shelter locations should not be publicized without permission from shelter operators — some shelters, particularly for women fleeing violence, are confidential for safety reasons. Mapping that enables harassment, protest, or harm is unethical.

16.8 Encampments and Ethical Mapping

Encampments — informal settlements where people experiencing homelessness live in tents, tarps, or makeshift structures — are visible, politically charged, and ethically complex to map.

Encampments emerge when shelter capacity is inadequate, housing is unaffordable, and people have nowhere else to go. They provide a degree of autonomy, community, and safety that shelters do not always offer. Encampments are also sites of vulnerability: inadequate sanitation, fire risk, exposure to weather, and threats of eviction.

Municipalities, police, and outreach workers often map encampments to coordinate services, deliver harm reduction supplies, or plan enforcement actions. The ethical question is: Does mapping help or harm the people living there?

Mapping can help when it supports:

Outreach: Connecting people to housing, health services, income supports, and harm reduction.
Resource delivery: Ensuring encampments have access to water, sanitation, food, and emergency supplies.
Harm reduction: Distributing naloxone, clean needles, tents, sleeping bags, and winter gear.
Advocacy: Documenting the scale of homelessness and the need for housing and supports.

Mapping can harm when it enables:

Eviction: Municipalities have used maps of encampments to prioritize sites for enforcement, clearing encampments and displacing people without offering alternative housing.
Surveillance: Mapping encampment locations, population counts, and individual movements can enable police monitoring, harassment, and criminalization.
Stigma: Public maps showing encampment locations can fuel NIMBYism, fear, and hostility toward people experiencing homelessness.

The ethical framework is clear: Do not map encampments without consent from the people living there, and do not map in ways that enable harm.

Consent means engaging with encampment residents, explaining why mapping is being done, who will have access to the map, and how it will be used. It means offering residents control over what is shared and what is protected. It means committing not to share data with police or enforcement agencies without explicit permission.

Some encampments have formal leadership structures or resident committees. Engagement should start there. Other encampments are more informal. In those cases, outreach workers, harm reduction staff, or trusted community advocates can facilitate engagement.

Mapping encampments for advocacy requires a different approach than mapping for service delivery. Advocacy maps may show aggregate data (number of encampments, estimated population) without revealing specific locations. They may include resident testimony, photos (with consent), and documentation of conditions — but always with attention to dignity, privacy, and the risk that the map could be used against the community.

The principle is simple: If you cannot guarantee that the map will be used only to help, do not make the map.

16.9 Housing Quality and Safety

Affordability is not the only housing issue. Housing quality and safety matter. A unit may be affordable but uninhabitable: mold, pests, structural hazards, inadequate heating, unsafe wiring, or lack of sanitation.

Housing quality is particularly poor at the bottom of the rental market. Low-income renters — who have the least bargaining power — are more likely to live in substandard housing. Landlords in low-income neighborhoods may neglect maintenance, knowing tenants have limited alternatives. Tenants may fear reporting violations, worried about eviction or retaliation.

Mapping housing quality involves data from multiple sources: municipal bylaw enforcement (complaints, inspections, violations), public health departments (mold, pests, sanitation), fire departments (safety violations), and tenant reports. Some municipalities maintain rental registries or licensing systems that track property conditions.

Quality mapping reveals spatial patterns. Some neighborhoods have concentrations of substandard housing. Some buildings — often owned by the same landlords — have repeated violations. Mapping these patterns supports enforcement prioritization, tenant organizing, and policy advocacy for stronger rental standards and proactive inspection systems.

Housing safety also includes fire risk. Rooming houses, illegal basement apartments, and overcrowded units are at higher risk. Mapping fire incidents, fire code violations, and housing types at risk supports prevention efforts.

In rural and remote areas, housing quality issues are often more severe. Many Indigenous communities live in overcrowded, structurally unsafe housing with inadequate water, sanitation, and heating. Mapping these conditions documents the scale of the crisis and supports advocacy for federal funding and infrastructure investment.

But quality mapping must be done carefully. Publicizing addresses of substandard housing can stigmatize residents, lower property values, or prompt landlords to evict tenants and redevelop rather than repair. Mapping should focus on system-level patterns and policy levers, not individual addresses — unless the goal is enforcement and residents support that action.

16.10 Policy and Planning Implications

Housing and homelessness mapping produces evidence that informs policy and planning. The question is: What actions does the map support?

Zoning reform: Affordability and rental supply mapping can justify zoning changes to allow multi-unit buildings, secondary suites, laneway housing, and gentle density in neighborhoods currently zoned for single-family only.

Inclusionary zoning: Mapping that shows where affordable housing is absent can support inclusionary zoning policies that require developers to include affordable units in new projects or contribute to affordable housing funds.

Public land for housing: Mapping public land holdings (municipal, provincial, federal) alongside housing need can identify sites for social housing development.

Tenant protections: Mapping evictions, renovictions, and rent increases can support rent control, eviction protection, and tenant rights legislation.

Supportive housing expansion: Mapping homelessness, shelter occupancy, and supportive housing waitlists can justify public investment in new supportive housing units.

Short-term rental regulation: Mapping Airbnb concentration and housing supply loss can justify regulations limiting short-term rentals and enforcement mechanisms.

Homelessness prevention: Mapping eviction risk, rent burden, and at-risk populations can support prevention programs: rental assistance, legal aid, and tenancy support.

Service coordination: Mapping the housing and homelessness service system (shelters, outreach, housing navigation, supportive housing) reveals overlaps, gaps, and opportunities for coordination.

But maps alone do not create policy change. Policy change requires political will, organized advocacy, public pressure, and often, legal challenges. Mapping is a tool — powerful, but not sufficient on its own.

16.11 Synthesis and Implications

Housing is not just a market commodity — it is the foundation of community stability, health, and opportunity. Mapping housing systems reveals how affordability, supply, quality, and access shape who can live in a community and under what conditions.

Several themes emerge across this chapter:

Hidden housing insecurity is larger than visible homelessness. Couch-surfing, doubled-up households, vehicle living, and precarious accommodations affect far more people than street homelessness. Mapping must account for what is hidden, not just what is visible.
Housing crises are local, but they are also systemic. Market forces, policy choices, historical inequities, and power structures determine who has access to housing. Mapping reveals the local patterns; addressing the crisis requires systemic change.
Mapping can help or harm. Maps that support outreach, resource delivery, and advocacy are ethical. Maps that enable eviction, surveillance, or exploitation are not. Consent, community authority, and the commitment to do no harm are non-negotiable.
Rental housing is under pressure. Loss of rental supply, financialization, short-term rental conversion, and demolition for redevelopment are reducing the housing available to renters. Mapping these trends supports policy advocacy for rental protections and supply expansion.
Housing quality matters as much as affordability. A unit that is affordable but unsafe or uninhabitable does not meet housing needs. Mapping must account for quality, not just cost.
Housing mapping must integrate multiple dimensions. Affordability, supply, quality, location, access, and the service system are interconnected. Mapping one dimension in isolation misses the bigger picture.

The practical implications for Community Mapping practitioners:

Work with consent, particularly when mapping vulnerable populations or sensitive locations.
Triangulate data sources. Census data, service data, and resident testimony together provide a fuller picture than any one source alone.
Map systems, not just points. Housing systems include markets, policies, services, and power structures — all of which shape outcomes.
Center equity. Ask who is underserved, who is excluded, and whose needs are not being met. Housing mapping that does not address equity is incomplete.
Commit to action. Housing mapping should inform decisions, support advocacy, or guide resource allocation. Mapping that produces insight but no action is a wasted opportunity.

Housing is a human right. Community Mapping that documents housing need, exposes inequity, and supports solutions is part of the work of making that right real.

16.12 Housing Systems Map

Purpose: This exercise helps students understand housing as a system — not just buildings and rents, but the relationships, policies, and flows that determine who has access to housing and under what conditions.

Materials Needed:

Large paper or digital whiteboard
Sticky notes or digital annotation tools
Data sources: local census data, rental market reports, shelter data, municipal housing strategy documents

Steps:

Identify system components. List all the elements of your local housing system: types of housing (ownership, rental, social, supportive, emergency), key actors (landlords, developers, tenants, nonprofits, municipal housing department, provincial/federal programs), policies (zoning, tenant protections, subsidies), and services (shelters, housing navigation, outreach).
Map relationships. Draw connections between components. How do they interact? Where do people move through the system (e.g., from shelter to transitional housing to permanent housing)? Where are the bottlenecks or gaps?
Identify flows. What flows through the system? People, money, information, housing units. Map these flows. Where do resources enter the system? Where do people get stuck? Where do units leave the system (demolition, conversion, loss)?
Highlight leverage points. Where could interventions have the greatest impact? Look for places where small changes could shift system behavior: policy changes, funding increases, coordination improvements, or removing barriers.
Test scenarios. What happens if rental supply decreases by 10%? What happens if supportive housing capacity doubles? What happens if eviction protections are strengthened? Walk through the system implications.
Reflect on equity. Who is served well by the current system? Who is excluded or underserved? Where are the equity gaps, and what would it take to close them?

Deliverable: A visual systems map showing components, relationships, flows, and leverage points, plus a 2-page reflection on what you learned about your local housing system.

Time Estimate: 2-3 hours (can be done individually or in groups)

Safety and Ethics Notes: Do not include identifying information about individuals or specific addresses of vulnerable people. Focus on system-level patterns, not individual cases. If your systems map reveals sensitive information (e.g., where unsheltered people are living), do not share it publicly without community consent.

Key Takeaways

Housing is community infrastructure. Without stable, affordable housing, people cannot access employment, education, healthcare, or social participation.
Hidden homelessness — couch-surfing, doubled-up, vehicle living — is far larger than visible street homelessness in most communities. Mapping must account for what is hidden.
Encampment mapping can support outreach and harm reduction or enable eviction and surveillance. The ethical rule: do not map without consent, and do not map in ways that enable harm.
Short-term rentals have removed housing supply from the rental market in many communities, driving up rents and displacing long-term residents. Mapping informs regulation and enforcement.
Supportive housing — permanent housing with voluntary integrated supports — is evidence-based and effective. Housing First works.
Housing systems are shaped by markets, policies, power, and historical inequities. Mapping reveals patterns; addressing the crisis requires systemic change.

Plain-Language Summary

Housing is the foundation that makes everything else possible. Without stable, affordable housing, people can't hold jobs, kids can't focus in school, and families can't build a future. This chapter looks at how to map housing systems: who can afford housing, where rental housing is disappearing, and how homelessness — both visible and hidden — affects communities.

Most people who experience homelessness aren't on the streets. They're couch-surfing, staying with friends or family temporarily, or living in cars. This "hidden homelessness" is much larger than what we see in shelters or encampments, but it's harder to count and easier to ignore.

Mapping homelessness and housing need can help — it can guide outreach, deliver resources, and make the case for more housing. But it can also cause harm. Maps showing where people are living in encampments have been used to evict them without offering alternatives. The ethical rule is simple: don't map people without their consent, and don't make maps that will be used to hurt them.

Housing systems are complex. They include the housing itself, the policies that control supply and cost, the services that help people access housing, and the power structures that decide who gets housed and who doesn't. Mapping these systems helps communities see where change is needed — and fight for it.

End of Chapter 16.

Chapter 16. Housing and Homelessness Mapping