At an intersection, you see a person with a sign saying, “Need money. Will work.” or “Homeless. Please help.” The sign will be cardboard, held by hands that may be any shade and any age. Sometimes this individual will have a sleeping back nearby, or a pet… or even, occasionally, a child…
If you live in a city, this has surely happened to you, so what do you do?
Some folks stare at the road ahead, carefully avoiding eye-contact, hoping this person will return the favor — that he won’t directly approach the window and force a shake of the head or some other direct response.
Some people carry little paper bags of healthy food. They want to help but avoid giving cash, because they don’t want to contribute to a drug or alcohol problem.
Depending on the person begging, still others (if they have the $) simply hand a dollar or two (or five or twenty) out the window with a “Good luck”, often hearing in return, “God bless”.
Polimom has, at one point or another, responded in all these ways (the determining factor is often my personal cash situation). I can’t always help… but I certainly want to. Yes, I worry that I’m being snookered — that some of these folks may actually walk back to their cars and drive home to their air conditioned living rooms to watch tv while they count the days “income”. But those folks are rare, and it takes no time at all to figure out who they are if you encounter them regularly.
Evidently, Polimom’s going about this all wrong:
As one of several new city initiatives to battle homelessness, White is asking Houstonians not to give money to street beggars, but instead to donate to organizations that help the homeless.
“We want people to give, but we want to give in a smart manner,” said White, who recently began spreading the word through radio advertisements. “If you see somebody begging in the streets, and you feel sorry for them, don’t give to that person, but instead give to organizations to help turn around lives.”
I appreciate the larger point here: organizations with training, resources, and funds can make an impact in ways that my direct (and very small) gesture cannot — but I think the Mayor’s initiative is only part of the equation… just like Polimom’s.
It isn’t that I can’t give to a local-level homeless organization; I absolutely could. Like many other families, we donate to various charities throughout the year, but only one of them is local… and it has little or nothing to do with the homeless.
However, Polimom is unlikely to tell AC, “No honey, we can’t give (a sandwich, five dollars) to that lady and her child. We wrote a check this year to an organization that will help all of them.” (FYI, I’ve had this very conversation. She cried.)
“Think globally, act locally” applies here, and Polimom is willing to re-channel some funds… but I’ll still check my cash situation at the intersections. Otherwise, my conscience won’t let me sleep at night.