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Now We Know
by James Glaser
The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), released the numbers this week from a study they did on homelessness in America. In the past anyone who wanted to refute the numbers of those homeless in this country could say that the numbers were wrong or that many people were counted twice. For this study HUD, took a "snapshot" of the homeless population all over the country, on one night in January of 2005. What they found is that there are 754,000 on any given night in this country. The majority are in shelters, but still 338,000 are living outside. Think about New York in the winter. In January of 2005, there were over 4,400 people living on the streets, with another 43,000+ in shelters. Shelters are not homes, you usually can't stay in one all day, so you are forced to hit the streets during the day, and hope you get a bed the next night. "Nationally, 34 percent of the homeless were families with children, while most of the rest were single men." That 34% works out to 256,360 family members in America who are homeless. What kind of attitude would you have if you grew up on the streets your whole life or even for part of it. Mine would be very bad. It is hard for me to even imagine what those hundreds of thousands of Americans are going through each and every day, but I do know it is wrong that these people are homeless in the richest nation on the globe. I know there are some people on the streets by choice, but no child is among them, and we are our brother's keeper. |
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