Patricia Garcia and Pelle Tracey earn Google Award for Inclusion Research

As the homelessness crisis in the United States continues to grow, homeless service agencies are increasingly relying on algorithms to make critical decisions about services. 

But the use of these technologies may perpetuate social inequality, leaving vulnerable individuals at risk of algorithmic bias.  

University of Michigan School of Information assistant professor Patricia Garcia and UMSI doctoral candidate Pelle Tracey were awarded a Google Award for Inclusion Research to study the impact of these systems. 

“Dr. Garcia and I are deeply concerned by the ways in which technology can reproduce or worsen injustice and inequality,” says Tracey. “In our research we’re interested in understanding these dynamics, and exploring strategies for combating these issues.” 

Their project, “Examining Algorithmic Decision Making in Homeless Service Systems” seeks to interview social workers and unhoused people, and study data from publicly available records to understand how algorithms are implemented in decision making processes.  

The research could have profound impacts on policy decisions on the state and national level and help decrease harm faced by people of color and people with severe disabilities who are seeking housing. 

“Research by other scholars has shown that some of the algorithmic tools used in homeless services are racially biased, such that people experiencing homelessness who are white may have systematically better outcomes,” Tracey says. “But these systems can perpetuate other harms as well—like deprioritizing people with severe mental illness, placing people in housing which doesn’t fit their needs, or reducing the input that unhoused people have in their own housing search. 

The stakes of these decisions are really high. If one of these tools miscategorizes a person they may spend months or years languishing in a shelter without getting help that they desperately need.”

Before coming to UMSI, Tracey worked as a social worker in homelessness services and is deeply passionate about helping people access safe, affordable and dignified housing. Garcia has long worked to publish research that examines the complex relationship between race, gender, technology and justice. 

“Receiving this award is an incredible honor,” Tracey says. “It will allow us to expand the scope of this research to include more cities across the US, and to hopefully paint a much fuller picture of how technology is currently used in homeless services in the US, and how it might be used differently going forward, in ways which support more just treatment of some of the most vulnerable people in our society.”

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Learn more about Patricia Garcia and Pelle Tracey.