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News :: Housing

How to Help the Homeless

Getting donations to help the homeless/
25 donations/gifts to help the homeless
+ Petition [We need your help]
By Bork – ex-homeless for Mayday New Orleans
Contact us: call 504-319-3300 or 504-302-9951 or 202-246-7665 or email either/both maydayneworleans (at) hotmail.com and jamieandjoe (at) hotmail.com [please reprint article each sections entirety]

The holidays are a busy time. You want to have fun. It’s easy to
forget that there are those of us who are not well off. Especially you can forget that some of us do not have houses, or family. But it really doesn't take long to set up a donation day if you’re willing to help. However, "radical or hip" you are- it's not cool to have while some of us have not. If you can’t spare even the time to organize some donations- you can still donate yourself.
Here are some suggestions as to what you can do for the homeless.
Organize a drive:
1) Contact the homeless- ask some on the street for the best programs to go to. Ask their name and any suggestions they have toward what small gifts would be most welcome. Get reports on which is the best shelter, soup kitchen, or other homeless program [many programs are cruel or misuse funds, or don’t allow the homeless to give input as to how the programs work.] – contact one of the recommendations and find what gifts they are willing to distribute.
2) Arrange with your Boss/principal/favorite restaurant /hangout/minister/student union/Church that you can have a donation day.
3) Get them to agree to your putting a large box or two in a public area that people can fill with the donations that the shelter of your choice is looking for and/or a place where money can be donated..
4) Get your church/ principal/head teacher/student union/boss, ect to promote the donation day in the ways they know best. With their permission, put up flyers of your own.
5) Tell all your friends repeatedly to make sure they help fill your donation box.
6) Then get someone with a car who loves you to deliver the donations to the homeless shelter- if possible arrange for the homeless whom you spoke with to be there and hand him/her a gift with your own hands- look into his or her eyes and tell them that they helped you to get these donations by telling you the best place to give to.
Additionally:
Create Lists Of Needed Donations - Call all the organizations in your community that aid the homeless and ask them what supplies they need on a regular basis. Make a list for each organization, along with its address, telephone number, and the name of a contact person. Then mail these lists to community organizations that may wish to help with donations -- every place from religious centers to radical spaces to children's organizations such as Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts.

Publish Shelter Information - Despite all of our efforts to spread the word about shelters, it is surprising how many people are unaware of their own local shelters and soup kitchens. Contact your local newspapers, church or synagogue bulletins, or civic groups newsletters about the possibility of running a weekly or monthly listing of area services available to the homeless. This could include each organization's particular needs for volunteers, food, and other donations.

List for Homeless Christmas and other day gifts:

1. Befriend a homeless person. Give them a kind word and a smile. Talk over a cup of hot chocolate or coffee.
2. Cleansing wipes, basic personal supplies
3. Basic over the counter medicines [ Tylenol for arthritis / Vaseline or lotion for weather-cracked skin/allergy meds/rubs for muscle soreness/other basic over the counter medications]
4. Hats/scarves/gloves/ warming chemicals,
5. Socks and underwear!!!! [Several pairs of clean socks and underwear that fit are among the best gifts you can give.] You can also offer to help do someone homeless’s laundry
6. Cans of ready to eat food or gift certificate to local grocery store, or Food gift certificates books [healthy food if possible rather than McDonalds]
7. books and magazines
8. passes/tickets for local busses so they can apply for jobs
9. A battery powered radio- a light- if solar powered or had-cranked one is even better
10. rain gear
11. Blankets/pad - a special personalized one is nice- maybe with their name on it [calligraphy in indelible ink or embroidered].
12. Take one or more homeless to a restaurant and eat with them- make friends
13. An mp3, or cd or tv/ dvd player [of course battery powered- give batteries too or… better yet a hand-crank or solar version of a TV/ with radio and maybe even a flashlight]
14. Give a pair of good shoes for working or walking or hiking- black can be used with more uniforms
15. Give the money and help needed to get id [birth certificate ordered, social security card ordered, ect]
16. Give a month's supply of medication
17. A good backpack
18. Give a tent [ask local homeless if the police are likely to destroy a tent beforehand
19. Rent a locker for a homeless person with easy access/ or arrange for a place to keep their things near their shelter/living area
20. Donate several monthly [or yearly] bus/trolley passes
21. Contact a homeless person and arrange to donate enough money for them to open a checking account and help her/him get one [you may need to help them with a form of id, ect]
22. Give a working homeless person the deposit needed for a room or apt. [you can arrange to meet them at the place they are trying to rent so that you can turn the money strait over to their landlord]
23. Employ the Homeless or encourage your church, job, ect to employ them– “HELP WANTED General Office Work. Welfare recipient, parolee, ex-addict OK. Good salary, benefits. Will train.” Statistics show that more than half the people who sign on will find permanent, well-paying jobs, often in maintenance, construction, clerical, or security work.
24. Help the homeless in organizing for personal or group benefit [ small things ling photocopies of anything from resumes to organizing flyers for homeless groups- in other words: ASK a homeless person what you can do for them [ give them an option within your comfort zone!!! Be imaginative- think what you would want if you had nothing and no one in your life!]
25. Push For State Homelessness Prevention Programs - While states routinely supply aid for the poor and homeless, many do not have programs provide funds and other services to those who will lose their homes in the immmediate future unless something is done. Homelessness comes at great financial and human cost to the families who are evicted or foreclosed.

Also: Stand Up For The Rights Of The Homeless –
Sign our petition!
[Email your signatures. questions, and comments to us at jamieandjoe (at) hotmail.com – or send it by letter – if your willing to either get some other signatures for us or send us a donation for our costs regarding a large, important survey that we are attempting to give to our local homeless.]
And/ or start a comparable one for you own area!
Our petition is based on the premise that people who are homeless are still human. That they retain their most admirable human qualities and that they must be allowed to exercise them.

Caricatures of most homeless with their hand out are just caricatures. The majority of homeless have never panhandled [and if ultimately forced to it- are greatly ashamed by it], the majority of adult homeless work at least some regular job [when allowed], and alcohol use – while sometimes prevalent, usually [according to studies] starts when on the street due to trying to sleep or self-medicate for aches and pains or depression.

Currently families are torn apart through arrogant and autocratic governmental policies. Children told they can not live with their families once they turn 13. Where is the respect for thefamily, the effort to help the children?

Many shelters who should be giving gentle hands up to housing are instead offer such insanely hellish conditions that homeless would rather be jailed then have to endure them. [And many commit minor offences to ensure to be jailed for the warmth, health and dental care, at greater expense to the taxpayer then to offer those services outright.]

Who are the non-homeless to insist they know how the homeless should live out their lives. Are they so perfect, so without blemish in their own lives that they should be telling the homeless they can have no important decisions of their own, no control, and no rights?

We think things have to change; this is what we are working for:

Mayday N.O. Petition:

We, the undersigned, require the following:

1 - The people who use the homeless services must have a voice / a vote in which providers are chosen to receive city contracts and which have a strong say in homeless planning. While some service providers are committed to providing high quality services to displaced/homeless people, others operate virtual jails. The homeless are in the best position to give feedback on this- not paid advocates or city employees. Additionally when long-term plans and advisory councils are made by the city, the homeless should have more then just token representation. Far more then a token or two. And ALL homeless representation should be chosen BY the homeless.

Poverty Pimps must be eliminated from the system of services as much as possible. [The term "poverty pimp" is defined as a derogatory label for an individual or group which, to its own benefit, acts as an intermediary on behalf of the poor. Literally, a poverty pimp is an individual or group who solicits for the poor, or it can mean, a welfare system procurer. Poverty pimps gain a higher quality of existence from exploiting the poverty of others.]

2 – Basic needs for employment and better living must be met for people to be able to get out of homelessness.amples
People forced to use the shelter system in New Orleans must have security for their possessions. We demand that lockers must be made available if no other alternative is possible to make certain the safety of homeless individual’s personal possessions. It is not just that shelters and police cannot just throw away people's possessions. Each homeless person should at least have access to their own locker in order to retain enough of their own possessions to help secure their future as best it can be
Also, transportation is another basic necessity that the homeless must have access to. Additionally free transportation must EASILY be made available to the homeless. Without transportation, the homeless have severely restricted access to health care, jobs, and food. With it their lives would be greatly improved. Current policies require a homeless person to stand in line, wait, then beg a social worker for a single token to perhaps get a token so they may get to work, or a doctor or food…

3 - We demand 24 hour access to shelter every day. People have a right to be sheltered from the elements; the daily practice of forcing people out of the shelters, especially the sick, elderly, disabled, often-in conditions of poor weather rain, and freezing weather serves no purpose other than to punish the poor.
Additionally, wet shelter programs [a shelter that allows people in while under the influence of alcohol] should be made available to those in need and with good behavior. Substances are often used as a way to cope with the desperation of having to live on the street. It does not make sense for someone to be thrown into the street and suffer heat stoke or frostbite because of one or 2 or even 3 beers.

4 - Resource guides must freely be made available to those who need them. Governmental aid is available for homeless people, but many may not know where to find it or how to apply. Resource guides often exist but are most only for the social worker who gets paid per time that the homeless come back to consult with her.
It is unconscionable to deny these guides to homeless people– as is the practice is some soup kitchens and shelters-- just to make money off of referrals. Social service agencies do not give out information, in formats accessible to most homeless. Instead of making agency information something that is worth scores of dollars, information should be freely and easily accessible to all homeless.

5 - We demand safe, humane, clean service facilities with no reduction in services. Conditions in most of the shelter system are so heinous that some residents deliberately get jailed every winter.
At a bare minimum shelters must provide blankets in sufficient quantity to keep residents warm and safety that includes safety from police harassment. Thought should be given to some sort of, community controlled not landlord/market controlled, Single Room Occupancy. It has to be cheaper for society to provide an extremely poor/ homeless person a room then our current common structure of a jail cell.
Also restrictions on family and couples be must be relaxed so that families can stay together. Currently 13 year old males may not stay with their mothers and sisters none the less fathers. Nor can couples stay together. Family values should extend to shelter not the splitting up of families.
Soup kitchens must provide enough food to keep people from still being hungry and meals must be healthy. Mental and physical heath concerns should be better, significantly increased in size, and more interconnected to the other services.

6 - The government [or people] must create enough affordable housing for all of its residents within five years and enact laws and policies to that effect. There is not and can never be a substitute for housing. While we recognize the need for emergency shelter, these crowded, filthy and often dangerous facilities are no alternative to creating affordable housing. 10 years is too long and the current plans do not take into account all the needs of the different homeless populations.
The least expensive way to shelter homeless is housing.

7 - Within two years the city of New Orleans must pass and implement a living/prevalent wage law binding all district employers especially those enjoying special status with the government such as tax breaks.
Homeless people are often given no choice but to work in jobs with dangerous conditions and sub-minimum wage pay. Current minimum wage laws are not being enforced; people are working for less then $6.00 an hour. Even when people do earn the legal minimum wage it is not sufficient for survival. It is NOT right that people work at jobs such as the convention center or the stadium yet are still homeless. Better wages can help reduce homelessness, so let’s require it..

8 - The Orleans district's ongoing campaign of police harassment and intimidation of our citizens must end.
All citizens have the right to equal access to public spaces in our community. Low-income residents of the district are frequently the target of police and private security, especially in high-visibility locations such as the French quarter. Police shall not harass homeless because they are homeless nor shall they steal or destroy their personal possessions!

9 - The city of New Orleans and other governments must demand accountability from its contractors and enact laws that promote fiscal responsibility among providers.
Poverty is an industry for the rich in the district. Billions of dollars are spent on poverty in our community, most of it on administrative salaries and overhead. One study found only 20% of these funds reach the people they're meant for. A clear need exists for regular auditing of agencies contracting with the city. Doubling dipping must come to an end. And homeless individuals and organizations have the most right to the relevant fiscal information!

10 - The city of New Orleans must ensure that those called upon to speak for us [homeless, and ex-homeless] are elected by us [homeless]. We demand a full fiscal investigation of service providers by an impartial oversight committee. We further demand a large representation, chosen by our [homeless people] consensus in a public process, on that committee. We call upon the city to prosecute those officials, both public and private, who have enriched themselves illegally at our expense and to demand from them restitution.

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