The Bush administration has made ending chronic homelessness a priority, encouraging states and local governments to adopt 10-year plans to reach that goal. In 2005, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development awarded $365 million nationwide for projects serving the chronically homeless and provided transitional and permanent housing for 27,000 people, said Robyn Raysor, deputy director of HUD's office of special needs assistance program.

Speaking Wednesday to some 300 conference attendees, Raysor said the federal agency is dedicated to ending chronic homelessness and praised Utah's efforts to do the same.

"We highly value the efforts that you make each and every day," she said. "You have a lot to be proud of."

On any given day in the United States, there are 800,000 people who meet HUD's definition of "homeless," which is those literally without a place to live. Another 3 million, Raysor said, are in "precarious housing situations."

State officials must always keep those people in mind, Utah's lieutenant governor said, whether they're making public policy decisions or looking for new locations for additional housing projects.

"We need to make sure that we do not forget the human element. It is so easy for all of us to see statistics and numbers and forget that these are human beings," Herbert said. "These are our neighbors. These are people."

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