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"Napa County's shelter system is holding more people than at any point in the series. The number of people who need it is rising anyway, and nearly half of them are new."
The Spotlight:
Welcome to Under the Hood, our exclusive weekly series for Napa Valley Features paid subscribers.
Summary of Today’s Article: Napa County’s Jan. 28 point-in-time count found 428 people experiencing homelessness, a 14% increase that reversed two consecutive years of decline. An estimated 190 of them — 44% — were experiencing homelessness for the first time, up from 33% the year before. County officials link the increase to housing costs outpacing wages and to a fiscal year in which no new housing came online for people in the county’s coordinated entry system. Measured per capita, Napa County’s rate remains the lowest among neighboring counties that ran comparable counts.
Beyond today’s discussion, we’re also digging into the latest results from our reader polls and pulling a few takeaways from our local economic dashboard.
Nearly Half of Napa County’s Homeless Population Was Homeless for the First Time
by Tim Carl
NAPA VALLEY, Calif. — Napa County counted 428 people experiencing homelessness on the morning of Jan. 28, a 14% increase over the prior year that reversed two consecutive years of decline.
The more consequential figure is 190. That is how many of those people the county estimates were experiencing homelessness for the first time — 44% of the count, up from 33% a year earlier.
A rise in first-time homelessness is a different signal from a rise in the total. It means the increase is not primarily people cycling back through the system. It is people entering it who had not been in it before.
The county says as much in its own account of the findings, calling it a particularly important data point because it may reflect broader economic and housing affordability challenges outside the direct control of the homeless services system.
What the Count Measures
The point-in-time count is a one-morning census the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development requires of regions receiving federal homelessness money. HUD requires it every two years. Napa County conducts it annually.
Napa County’s version is thorough. Forty-three volunteers and nine peer guides working in 15 teams canvassed all 38 census tracts in the county, including the Lake Berryessa area and more remote parts of the county. The general street count runs from 5 a.m. to 9 a.m., with a separate targeted count of unsheltered youth under 25 conducted between 3 p.m. and 7 p.m.
The first-time figure comes from a different instrument. In the weeks following the count, peer surveyors conduct in-person interviews with roughly 250 people, and it is that survey — not the street count — that establishes how many are experiencing homelessness for the first time. The 190 figure is the survey share applied to the full count of 428, not 190 individuals identified one by one.
That does not make it soft. It is how HUD expects these questions to be answered. But it is an estimate and worth reading as one.
A Change in Who Runs the Count
There is a second methodological wrinkle, and the county discloses it plainly.
Napa County has historically contracted with outside technical assistance providers for the count, survey collection and data analysis. In 2024, according to the county, concerns with the provider led it — along with many other Bay Area counties — to decline to renew that contract and instead conduct the work in-house, with Homeless Programs staff working alongside county IT and continuum of care partners. Preparation for the January count began in March 2025.
What the county has not specified is which count was the first conducted in-house. That matters. If 2026 was the first, then this year’s 14% increase is the figure carrying a change in who ran the count. If 2025 was the first, then last year’s decline to 374 is.
The distinction is not academic in Napa County. When the count’s methodology last changed materially in 2020, the tally rose 44% in a single year, and officials attributed much of that jump to the new approach rather than to conditions on the ground.
Napa County Housing and Community Services has been asked which year marked the transition and whether it considers the 2025 and 2026 counts directly comparable. This story will be updated if the county responds.
The Two-Year Reversal
With that caveat attached, the 2026 result has to be read against what preceded it.
The county counted 506 people in 2023, 414 in 2024 and 374 in 2025, a decline driven almost entirely by a collapse in unsheltered homelessness from 349 people to 175.
That decline had a specific cause. Three affordable housing projects opened in the Napa community after 2021 — Valley Lodge Apartments, Heritage House Valley Verde and Manzanita — each including units dedicated through coordinated entry for people exiting homelessness. Annual declines in homelessness followed the 2023 count.
The sheltered count rose over the same span, from 157 in 2023 to 222 in 2026, and now stands at the highest point in the series. What changed was the unsheltered line, which rose from 175 to 206 this year, the first increase in the series.
In fiscal year 2025-26, no new housing projects opened.
Emma Moyer, interim director of Napa County Housing and Community Services, tied the increase to conditions rather than to the service system.
“What we’re seeing across a lot of communities is inflation and housing costs are outpacing wages,” Moyer told the Napa Valley Register.
More People Sheltered Than Outside
One trend did continue. Of the 428 people counted, 222 were in shelter and 206 were outside — 52% against 48%, the second consecutive year in which more people were counted in shelter than in places not meant for habitation.
The county frames that as evidence its providers are reaching people who have historically been difficult to engage. The placement figures support the claim. During fiscal year 2024-25, housing, outreach and sheltering services moved 263 households into permanent housing, and 93.6% of those households were still housed six months later.
That is a system working for the people already in it. The first-time number describes people arriving at its door.
The Arithmetic Underneath
The county’s framing points at wages rather than at shelter capacity, and the arithmetic this column has documented elsewhere supports it.
Napa County’s median home price of roughly $937,500 sits at about 8.6 times median household income, against 4.54 times in 2010. Buying at current mortgage rates requires roughly $230,000 in household income under conventional underwriting. The county’s mean occupational wage is near $70,000. Advertised salaries in 2025 cluster closer to $50,000. The 2018 lodging market study’s weighted average hotel wage, adjusted to 2025 dollars, is about $56,000 — a wage at which the median home costs roughly 17 years of gross pay and at which two earners together reach the mid-$400,000s.
The gap is wider still upvalley. The Calistoga area’s median household income runs between roughly $57,000 and $61,000, against a countywide median of $70,925 at the time of that assessment.
Housing production and wage levels are the two ends of the same ratio. A household does not become homeless because a unit does not exist. It becomes homeless because the units that do exist cost more than the job pays. That distinction determines what a policy response would have to look like, and it is the one the county’s own analysis makes: rising housing costs, stagnant wages and households with thin financial reserves losing housing first.
Where Napa County Sits Among Its Neighbors
Raw counts across counties of different sizes say little. Adjusted for population, Napa County has the lowest rate in the region.
Napa County counted about 31 people per 10,000 residents in 2024 and about 31 in 2026, dipping to roughly 27 in 2025 before this year’s increase. Over the same two years Sonoma County fell from roughly 52 to 40 while holding its count flat at 1,951. Solano County fell from about 38 to 34 after its own count found 1,543 people, a 10.6% decrease.
Two nearby counties are missing from the comparison for structural reasons. Marin County conducted a 2026 count but has not released results. Mendocino County’s continuum of care conducted only the sheltered portion this year, citing staff capacity, and will have no comparable total.
What the First-Time Number Suggests
The subpopulation data is where the Napa County story diverges from its neighbors’.
Sonoma County’s flat 2026 count concealed a 46% rise in youth homelessness traceable to a single provider closing. Solano County’s decline coincided with a 125-bed navigation center opening in Vallejo. Those are capacity stories.
Napa County’s 44% first-time share is not. It describes households that were housed a year ago and are not now — the population that wage-to-cost pressure reaches first and that shelter capacity, however well built, does not prevent.
Whether the wine industry’s contraction and the agricultural employment losses that have accompanied it are driving that increase is not something a January morning census can establish. The full 2026 report with demographic and cause-of-housing-loss data is the document that could.
What Is Not Yet Public
Two gaps limit what can be said.
The count canvassed all 38 census tracts, so tract-level data exists, but the county has not published a breakdown by jurisdiction. Whether the increase concentrated in the city of Napa or reached American Canyon, St. Helena and Calistoga is unknown outside the county.
Federal reporting has also slipped. HUD’s national assessment, which normally standardizes and validates these figures across regions, ran months behind schedule this year.
For now the finding stands on its own terms. Napa County’s shelter system is holding more people than at any point in the series. The number of people who need it is rising anyway, and nearly half of them are new.
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Tim Carl is a Napa Valley-based photojournalist.
Sources:
Napa County, Point-in-Time Count
Sonoma Index-Tribune, New homeless count figures are out for Sonoma and Napa counties
County of Sonoma, preliminary 2026 Point-in-Time Count release
Solano County 2026 Point-in-Time Count Community Report, CAP Solano JPA
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, PIT counts by continuum of care
California Department of Finance, E-1 population estimates
Correction, Aug. 30, 2026: An earlier version of this article said the sheltered count "rose in step" from 2023 to 2026 and that the trend never broke. The sheltered count fell from 211 in 2024 to 199 in 2025 before rising to 222 in 2026. The corrected passage appears above.
Today’s Polls:
Recent Poll Results:
In Tim Carl’s article “Under the Hood: Beckstoffer Retreats as Lake County Cabernet Economics Unravel,” Beckstoffer Vineyards’ major reduction of Lake County vineyard acreage illustrates the growing economic pressure on the region’s winegrape industry. Falling cabernet prices, declining production and sharply lower gross returns per bearing acre have widened the divide between Lake County’s value-oriented market and Napa’s premium market. The accompanying reader polls show strong concern about Lake County’s long-term vineyard economy, mixed views about how much protection Napa’s price premium provides and a preference for finding new buyers or markets when grape contracts disappear.
Question: How much do falling grape prices threaten Lake County’s long-term vineyard economy?
Summary: Threat to Lake County’s long-term vineyard economy. Most respondents see falling grape prices as a severe threat, with 81% saying “Very much” and 15% saying “Extremely.” Only 4% say “Somewhat” while no respondents selected “A little” or “Not at all.” Total responses: 26.
Question: Statement: Napa’s price premium gives its vineyards more protection during a wine downturn.
Summary: Napa’s price premium and vineyard protection. Views are mixed, with 38% neutral or unsure and 39% agreeing or strongly agreeing that Napa’s premium offers greater protection during a downturn. Another 23% disagree or strongly disagree. Total responses: 26.
Question: What should growers do first when grape contracts disappear?
Summary: First response when grape contracts disappear. Seeking new buyers or markets leads at 40% while 32% favor removing unprofitable vines. Cutting farming costs and waiting for prices to recover each draw 12% while 4% favor shifting to stronger varieties. Total responses: 25.
The Economy:
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The views, opinions and data presented in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy, position or perspective of Napa Valley Features or its editorial team. Any content provided by our authors is their own and is not intended to malign any group, organization, company or individual.
Our illustrations are produced through a multistep process of generative tools, digital sketching and photo editing, often starting from our own images or sketches.
It’s time to get serious about housing. While wages are a significant driver of homelessness, it’s improbable that at this point we’d be able to catch up to those wages. If anything, having higher paying jobs would attract even more people here, which, for the record, I do believe is a good thing…as long as there’s sufficient housing.
Just as an example, 100% AMI for a family of four in SF is $162,100. Using the $937,500 figure published in the article, that’s still 5.78x wages for housing. It wouldn’t be easy to get that level of income in Napa without reshaping our entire economy.
> Housing production and wage levels are two ends of the same ratio.
I 100% agree. Let’s start doing something about it. Get involved with your local city/town council. Napa city is rewriting its zoning code. That’s a great place for people to learn how these bureaucratic decisions affect every decision they make. Just showing up means something.
https://media.api.sf.gov/documents/2026_AMI-IncomeLimits-HMFA.pdf