Estimates from the City of Minneapolis show there were only 21 unsheltered people living in encampments across the city as of April 2. On Sunday, city data said there were only an estimated 20 unsheltered people across 15 Minneapolis homeless encampments.
This data comes after Chief Brian O’Hara of the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) issued a special order in January which allows officers to more forcefully address public safety concerns involving homeless encampments. Essentially, the order enables law enforcement to promptly take down existing encampments and keep new encampments from forming.
Speaking to KARE 11, Mayor Jacob Frey said: “We were seeing homeless encampments as large as 150 to 200 people. Right now we have zero significant encampments in the city, and the largest one we’re aware of is four people.”
O’Hara similarly praised the effort in a media release, saying, “In 2024, encampment-related violence devastated lives—15 people were fatally shot, and 387 overdoses occurred within one block of encampments, accounting for 13% of the city’s total overdoses. We implemented this special order to stop this crisis before it starts. The results are clear: fewer encampments, fewer shootings, and safer neighborhoods.”
However, one of Frey’s opponents in the upcoming mayoral race, State Sen. Omar Fateh, DFL-Minneapolis, criticized the effort by saying the city was only “hiding homelessness.”
“Hiding homelessness doesn’t solve it,” Fateh posted on X. “We can’t celebrate this data as a win in partnership with our unhoused neighbors. Sadly this reflects an uptick in MPD aggression that makes vulnerable people more invisible. We need a humane response—not ‘out of sight, out of mind.'”
Frey responded to Fateh and noted that Minneapolis has worked to provide shelter to those who would otherwise be in encampments.
“Picking a fight about fewer people sleeping outside is bizarre,” Frey posted on Wednesday. “As of this morning, 27 people are experiencing unsheltered homelessness across our city—down from more than 200 last year. That’s because we’ve worked closely with partners to provide shelter and housing, and yes, to prevent encampments. Claiming there has been an ‘uptick in MPD aggression’ without a shred of evidence isn’t just disappointing—it’s a gross political lie. But that’s pretty in line with your usual MO.”
Soren Stevenson, candidate for Minneapolis City Council in Ward 8, responded to the thread and questioned the validity of the city’s data.
“As a homeless outreach worker in Minneapolis, I have seen more than 27 people sleeping outside this week alone,” said Stevenson. “I’m very curious to talk about where you got that number from. A comprehensive count has not taken place since February.”
Alpha News reached out to the City of Minneapolis with questions about the situation and asked for a response to some of the criticisms.
According to a Minneapolis spokesperson, the city’s data is regularly updated and collected by a Homeless Response Team which travels “to areas around the city where unsheltered individuals may be located based on reports from 911, 311, and other coordinated entities.”
According to the 2024 Point-in-Time (PIT) Count of homeless individuals in Hennepin county, 3,370 people were staying in shelters and transitional housing programs, and 496 people were experiencing unsheltered homelessness in January of that year.
In January of 2025, the Minnesota Star Tribune reported that Hennepin County stopped tracking the number of homeless people it turned away from shelters after all 809 permanent beds in the county became fully booked.
Alpha News spoke with Stanley Genadek, a popular YouTube host, in December about his up-close look at the city’s homeless crisis.
“I’ve worked digging basements and demoing houses and building walls and doing stuff inside of Minneapolis for the better part of the last 20 to 30 years, but I noticed things were taking a sudden and dramatic turn, but nobody was speaking out about this,” he said at the time. “You could find blurbs on the news here and there, but the truth of how far it had fallen wasn’t out there in a way for people to see and experience.”
Sarah Prentice
Sarah Prentice has previously written for Campus Reform and worked as an intern at Media Research Center. While continuing to pursue her degree in political science, she worked full-time in communications and media outreach for a pro-woman, pro-life non-profit. Now a fellow at Alpha News during her senior year of college, she hopes to graduate with her political science degree from SUNY Brockport and combine it with her media and communications experience to pursue political journalism. She has a special interest in reporting on stories related to social issues, education, public health, and religious freedom.
