09/04/2026
Not wanting to hijack another entity’s thread about the problems of homeless sleeping Towson library, I felt compelled to write this post. Sometimes we forget that the homeless are frankly citizens too.
Let's talk about who's sleeping outside the Towson library — and why "just call someone" isn't working
If you've walked past the Towson branch in the early morning, you've seen it. People sleeping in the doorway, in the alcoves, along the wall. It's easy to react with frustration, or with pity, and then move on. I want to offer something more useful: where people can actually go, and why so many of them aren't going there.
What the county's own numbers say
On a single night in January 2025, Baltimore County counted 651 people experiencing homelessness — 573 in emergency shelter and 78 with nowhere indoors at all. That's up from 565 the year before. Nearly a quarter were children under 18. Another one in five was over 55. More than 100 of the adults counted reported living with a serious mental illness. Twenty-five unaccompanied young people were in shelter — up from 10 the previous year.
Those aren't strangers passing through. Those are our neighbors.
Where someone can actually go
If you want to help a specific person, these are the real doors:
☎️ Coordinated Entry hotline — 410-887-8463, press 1. This is the front door to every county shelter bed. Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 7 p.m.
☎️ CAN Street Outreach Team — 443-794-1849. For someone already outside and waiting on a callback.
📍 Prologue Outreach Center — 609 Baltimore Avenue, Towson. Walk-in, no referral needed. Monday through Thursday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Please don't lead with a police call. An officer can move someone off a step. They can't produce a bed that doesn't exist.
Now the hard part
Look closely at those hours. The hotline closes at 7 p.m. and doesn't open again until Monday morning. Prologue is closed Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. If you lose your housing on a Friday evening in Towson, there is no live human to call until Monday. The library is not being used as a shelter because people are entitled — it's the only warm, lit, public building with a bathroom that's open when nothing else is.
There's more:
🔹 County policy requires anyone accepting emergency shelter to independently manage all activities of daily living — eating, toileting, showering. The people most visibly struggling on the street are frequently the ones this rule screens out.
🔹 The county's Continuum of Care currently operates zero transitional housing beds. That middle rung between a shelter mat and a lease is simply gone.
🔹 Supportive housing and rapid re-housing aren't services you receive. They're waitlists you join.
🔹 Shelters offer mental health referrals. For the 100-plus adults counted with serious mental illness, a referral is not treatment.
What actually moves this
Extended hotline hours, including weekends. A 24-hour drop-in or respite site in central Towson. Shelter intake that doesn't exclude people for the disabilities that put them outside in the first place. Real funding for permanent supportive housing instead of a waitlist.
Those are county budget and policy decisions. They belong to the County Executive and your County Council member, and they respond to constituent pressure. Save the number. Make the call. And when you walk past that doorway tomorrow morning, remember you're looking at a policy gap, not a character flaw. 💙
Baltimore County Government and Resources.
