Jan. 27—Jason Daugharthy and Jodie Carol had company Wednesday afternoon.
As the couple's dog yapped and whined away, Daugharthy unzipped the front flap of the tent where they live behind the Southern States Frederick Co-op on East South Street. He stepped out into the chilly air, cigarette dangling from his fingers, and offered handshakes to each of the outreach workers standing before him.
He and Carol have been homeless for about a month now, but they've only been staying in their current setup for a few days. Though the black tarp hanging over their roof has yet to be tested by rain or snow, Daugharthy is confident it'll hold up. He cracked jokes while speaking with the workers.
"This is my brokeass Taj Mahal," he said with a chuckle.
Outreach workers with the city of Frederick's Housing and Human Services Department and a certified peer recovery specialist with the county health department spoke to Daugharthy and Carol for the city's annual count of sheltered and unsheltered homeless people in the area.
The point-in-time census — which takes place each January over the course of one day — is a process required by the U.S. Department of Housing and Human Services. On Wednesday, HHS staff members hiked through tent camps in the city and surveyed other unhoused people standing along roadways. Programs that offer temporary housing in the city — the Heartly House, Religious Coalition and Rescue Mission, among others — conducted their own counts.
The yearly survey is a useful way for the city to help residents understand the extent of homelessness in their community, said Michele Ott, administrative services supervisor at HHS. The condensed count conducted in 2021 — the first winter of the pandemic — identified 225 unhoused people, 56 of whom were unsheltered, she said. The department will finalize this year's count over the next few weeks.
"There's people who think, 'Oh, we don't have a homeless problem in Frederick,' but then there's people saying, 'We have a very large homeless problem,' " she said. "This kind of helps put some numbers to those questions."
Outreach workers ask a series of questions to the unhoused people they survey, including demographic information like their race, gender and veteran status. They also ask people about their experiences with substance use, mental health issues and other factors that may have contributed to their homelessness.
When Joe Keen, the certified peer recovery specialist tagging along for the survey, asked Daugharthy how old he was, the 43-year-old grinned.
"Are you gonna take me out to dinner first?" he joked.
Keen, who works with the County Health Department's "Street Safe" program, and the other outreach workers laughed. "I got Slim Jims," Keen offered.
HHS outreach workers check in on unhoused people living in tent encampments around the city about once a week, Ott said. They'll see if anybody needs anything and pass out blankets and warm clothing in the winter. It helps staff members build relationships with people, especially those who are more cautious to speak with them, Ott said.
On Wednesday, Steven Jackson — who's been with HHS for eight years — carried three drawstring bags filled with hygiene kits, emergency blankets and gloves. Annette Hubbard, another outreach worker, fanned out a stack of McDonald's gift cards.
Daugharthy and Carol keep warm in their tent with a camp stove that doubles as a heater, but Carol says they still feel the cold. She unzipped the structure's window to give a quick tour of the tidy space where they live. The floor is clean, with their sleeping bags pushed up against one wall and the little stove against another. A guitar sits in one corner — that's Daugharthy's, Carol said.
She smiled. "He's very talented."
If she and Daugharthy go to a shelter, they worry they wouldn't be able to bring their dog. Daugharthy jokes that the animal is spoiled rotten and is already entering his "terrible 2s" even though he's still a year old.
But it's clear how much they adore him. He's their big baby, Carol said.
"I'd rather suffer in the cold than not have him," she added.
As the outreach workers trekked away, Hubbard remarked that it's uncommon for people to set up tents in the kind of open field where Daugharthy and Carol live. Instead, people often set up their homes in well-forested areas, where they're less likely to be bothered.
Indeed, as Hubbard and the other outreach workers moved deeper into the trees behind Southern States, signs of current and former inhabitants became more regular. Coats hung from branches and shoes sat half-buried in the dirt.
"Anyone home?" Keen called out anytime the workers approached a tent or other makeshift shelter. There was frequently no answer — people often find other places to stay warm during the day, Hubbard explained. This year, for the first time, HHS will be sending out more outreach workers closer to nighttime to count as many unhoused people as possible.
Hubbard will also return to the encampment later that day, but she'll be bringing dog food for Daugharthy and Carol.
"Things like that, you don't think about," she remarked.
Ott couldn't give an exact number of encampments that exist in Frederick, but she noted the one behind Southern States is among the biggest in the city. You'd be surprised where others are located, Hubbard said. Someone could drive past a place where people have established a tent community a thousand times without knowing it's there.
Douglas Chaffman and his partner live farther in the woods than Daugharthy and Carol. They stayed in hotels for a few months four winters ago but eventually found it too hard to keep up with the nightly payments. Now, they split their time between two neatly organized tents in the forest near the East Street traffic circle.
The couple's cat, Rhythm, leaped from one of the tents when Chaffman's partner opened the front flap. They've had him since he was just two days old, Chaffman said, smiling. His partner bottle fed him until he opened his eyes. He's older now, but you wouldn't know it — he's a spry little thing who clambers all over the branches surrounding their home.
Chaffman gets upset when he thinks of the stereotypes people hold about unhoused folks like himself and his partner. Not everyone is addicted to drugs or alcohol, he said. When Keen offered him Narcan — medicine used to treat overdoses — Chaffman declined.
He and his partner don't do drugs, he told the outreach workers. They don't even drink.
Instead, they spend the $1,074 disability check Chaffman gets each month on things they need — stuff like food and propane for their stove and lantern. He is careful to use the money to pay back others who have lent him cash, too.
There's a Bible verse he often turns to when he thinks of the assumptions people make about him and his partner without even knowing them.
"Therefore you have no excuse, whoever you are, when you judge others," Romans 2:1 reads, "for in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things."
Chaffman joked with Jackson before the outreach worker moved on. "Don't fall and bust your butt, Stevie!" he teased him.
As Jackson ducked through tree branches to walk away, Rhythm peered out from a tangle of branches, carefully watching him go.
Follow Angela Roberts on Twitter: @24_angier
