In the last years of my career as an educator I was privileged to work in one of the KIPP Public Charter Schools. My students were mostly Hispanic or Black and many of them came from low income families. They were sometimes referred to as underserved, one label among others that they did not like. In fact, they often reminded me and the other teachers that their parents were hard working, loving people intent on providing them with the best possible education and opportunities to succeed in life. I grew to respect them and their families enormously, witnessing the sacrifices that they made to rise on the educational and economic ladder.
One of the students asked me to be the adult sponsor for a club whose sole purpose would be to raise funds to distribute to worthy causes that help the people of the world. She offered a convincing proposal for such an organization so we decided on a day and time for the first meeting. We sent out flyers to students inviting them to be part of the group and then held our breaths in anticipation of who might actually attend that first meeting. To my surprise and relief the classroom was packed with eager participants who listened intently to the ideas of the young woman who had created the new group. Before the end of the gathering she had planned a weekly after school bake sale with promises from many students of homemade goodies to offer.
The first sale was an enormous success but I worried that the initial enthusiasm would wane as the school year moved forward. Instead more and more students wanted to take part in the club and the selection of cupcakes and cookies and only grew. Before long I had locked away a veritable treasure in the school vault that belonged to the club, so it was time to decide how to donate the proceeds from the bake sale and other events like car washes and such.
There had been a terrible earthquake in Haiti that seemed to demand our attention from the get go. Our first choice was to send half of what we had earned, which was substantial, to the Red Cross fund that had been set up specifically for that horrific tragedy. With our first donation sealed the students’ enthusiasm grew in ambition. The energy behind the scenes was electric and the meetings involved lively discussions of who and how to help.
One of the most genuine and generous students suggested that we make dinners to distribute to the homeless people who gathered in certain spots of downtown Houston. He described a process that his mother had used to make chicken with rice for big crowds. He describe how we might place the meals in individual containers and them carry to the people who would no doubt enjoy some good home cooking. His idea was so detailed that we already knew how much it would cost, how long it would take to prepare, and where the best places to distribute it would be.
I explained to the students that I had to get approval for such a venture by checking with the upper levels of administration since we would be officially representing the charter schools and delivering our food in a school owned vans. I did not tarry in attempting to garner all of the appropriate consents and soon found out that nobody can distribute food to homeless people in our city without an official permit acquired through a long process at City Hall. Inquiries soon convinced me that our group would never get such a document and therefore this was not something that we would be able to do no matter how wonderful it seemed to be.
Of course the students were distraught to hear to news. Some of them went so far as to do research on their own to find a loophole. They soon enough learned that the roadblocks to such charitable work are enormous and we gave up on the idea with great sorrow.
This background story gets me to the heart of this essay. There are a magnitude of rules and laws that make it almost impossible to help homeless people without handing them cash and hoping that it gets used for all the right purposes. We can’t distribute food without jumping through legal hoops and now the Supreme Court says that if a city or town outlaws sleeping in public places, homeless individuals may be punished for doing so. The question becomes who is going to make sure that they have the resources they need to eat and be able to sleep at night?
Our homeless population is on the streets for a multitude of reasons. Some are indeed addicted to drugs or alcohol, but many suffer from mental illnesses that have been left untreated. There are families that have simply hit hard times. There are veterans suffering from multiple illnesses including PTSD. My grandson recently reminded me that we should not just view such people as losers or somehow deficient. But circumstance we might find ourselves or someone we know among them.
My grandfather often spoke of the grinding inhumanity of poverty. He remembered seeing Coxey’s Army when he was a young boy. They were a congregations of poor souls who were starving, homeless and unable to enjoy the security of home and food that most of us take for granted. This was back in the nineteenth century and we still have people who struggle to find the most basic necessities of living more than a century later.
Over time we’ve called such people bums or hoboes or Okies. We’ve read about them in The Grapes of Wrath. We often dehumanize them and view them as nuisances who scar the landscape of our cities. We see them as a problem but do so little to help solve the problem like my students attempted to do. We want to punish them rather than work to help them live a dignified life. We don’t want to spend money on them because we see them as helpless and hopeless individuals who will waste or efforts.
It is our shame to be this way. My grandfather told me this years ago. My students saw this as well. It’s time that we find a humane way to deal with the people who have no place to go instead of creating laws that dehumanize them. They have many needs that we can provide on the way to helping them overcome the issues that have made them homeless in the first place. It’s long past time to really try. We can no longer just look the other way or tsk tsk when we see them. Surely we have enough to share our bounty and our love.
All It Takes Is A Little Love 