Douglas County count finds no one unsheltered in unincorporated areas

Douglas County officials say the latest Metro Denver point-in-time count found no one sleeping outside in unincorporated Douglas County, a result the county is crediting to its Homeless Engagement and Resource Team, known as HEART.

The count, taken overnight from Jan. 26 through the morning of Jan. 27, 2026, identified zero individuals living unsheltered in the county’s unincorporated areas. County leaders plan to recognize the communities tied to that result at the May 26 Commissioners’ Business Meeting and fold the finding into a Project Zero recognition effort.

The headline number, however, sits inside a broader county picture that was not zero. Across Douglas County as a whole, the count found four people living unsheltered outdoors, 18 sleeping in vehicles and 23 in temporary or emergency shelter. The county said the outdoors count and vehicle count were concentrated in Parker and Castle Rock, with 12 people located in Parker and 10 in Castle Rock. Officials also said the 2026 count found no encampments larger than one person and no panhandlers.

County leaders are tying the result to HEART, a co-responder model launched in 2022 and later supported by a $1.6 million state grant. The team pairs trained navigators with local law enforcement and describes itself as the county’s front-line response for residents experiencing homelessness. In 2025, HEART completed 1,501 proactive outreach attempts, housed or sheltered 327 participants and served 332 people overall, figures the county says show the outcome was built through repeated outreach rather than a one-night spike.

Douglas County has been arguing for two years that those outreach efforts are moving the numbers. The county said preliminary January 2023 data showed unsheltered homelessness was down 46%, and later reported that methodology changes by Metro Denver Homeless Initiative meant 11 people counted in 2023 would not have been included in 2022. Even after that adjustment, the county said unsheltered homelessness was down 36% from 2022. In its 2025 summer count, Douglas County said it found zero people sleeping outside in Castle Pines, Lone Tree and rural unincorporated Douglas County, four people sleeping outside countywide, and zero encampments anywhere in the county.

That summer count used five HEART teams and focused on parking lots, outdoor spaces, intersections and transit centers. It recorded 1,181 contacts, 214 refusals, 54 safety concerns, 331 people served and seven people who returned to homelessness after a point-in-time intervention. Douglas County has also joined the Built for Zero pledge, and the county said the 2024 summer count showed a 50% drop in unsheltered homelessness from 2023.

The latest finding puts unincorporated Douglas County in a stronger position than several surrounding areas named by the county, including Highlands Ranch, Meridian Village, The Pinery, Stonegate, Lone Tree, Castle Pines, Larkspur, Sedalia, Roxborough, Sterling Ranch and Franktown. But the regional system matters: Metro Denver Homeless Initiative says the annual count is only a single-night snapshot required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and does not capture people doubled up with family or friends or staying in motels. In that sense, Douglas County’s zero in unincorporated areas is a narrow but real measure, not the full story of housing instability across the county or the metro area.