The Mayor's Office announced today that there are more homeless families in Boston. Mayor Thomas Menino and company held their annual Homeless Census and got the bad news.

The number of homeless families shot up by 22%, from 2,535 to 3,084 this year.* This rise is alarming. The press office notes, "The number for families is higher for the third year in a row, meaning that children continue to be our fastest growing homeless population."

The total number of homeless moved up slightly by 3.9%. On the upside, fewer single adults are in local shelters.

The full release is available on the Mayor's official site.

*The number reflects the individual family members, not units.

Photo captioned "Homeless in the West Fens" by Dave Daniels from photos tagged "Bostonist" on Flickr.