Food for the Homeless - NYC
I helped out at a soup kitchen associated with a Lutheran Church in the Lower East Side today. It was my second time there. Homelessness and unemployment appears to be a big problem in Manhattan. In no other city (I have lived in) have I seen so many people on the streets and scouraging through trash cans for food and drink.
I think the soup kitchen and homeless outreach programs in the city have a lot of potential. They are doing very good work but can definitely be improved in many ways. Many of the volunteers at these kitchens appear to be from low socioeconomic backgrounds themselves.They say you can "get by" in New York without a job. People get their meals at soup kitchens and pay for rent through intermittent work and sometimes by "unsavoury" means.
The volunteers generally seemed nice enough but did not have the capacity to carry out tasks very efficiently. For instance, one of the group leaders today was tasked with telling the servers how many people to serve based on how many seats were available at the tables. The group leader however, did not make this her priority & as a result, the server would refuse to serve more homeless people even when there were clearly a number of seats available.
The second thing I took note of were the group of 8th Graders who had dropped by to help today. Apparently they were from a private school in the Bronx which had community service as part of the school's curriculum. I think young people bring a lot of enthusiasm into any activity. If we can briddle this subpopulation and channel all their energy into various community efforts we would not just enrich the lives of the little ones but also the disadvantaged who, with their free meal, get a chirpy "Happy Friday!" from a little 8th Grader instead of a grouchy splat of food from their usual server.
Last night I also helped out with another food service for homeless people. The volunteers with this group were younger and more educated and work was carried out much more efficiently. Three vans were driven along different routes, stopping about 12 times per route to bring food to different homeless populations around Manhattan. Again, an excellent service and vehicle through which we might be able to reach out to the New York homeless.
I think the soup kitchen and homeless outreach programs in the city have a lot of potential. They are doing very good work but can definitely be improved in many ways. Many of the volunteers at these kitchens appear to be from low socioeconomic backgrounds themselves.They say you can "get by" in New York without a job. People get their meals at soup kitchens and pay for rent through intermittent work and sometimes by "unsavoury" means.
The volunteers generally seemed nice enough but did not have the capacity to carry out tasks very efficiently. For instance, one of the group leaders today was tasked with telling the servers how many people to serve based on how many seats were available at the tables. The group leader however, did not make this her priority & as a result, the server would refuse to serve more homeless people even when there were clearly a number of seats available.
The second thing I took note of were the group of 8th Graders who had dropped by to help today. Apparently they were from a private school in the Bronx which had community service as part of the school's curriculum. I think young people bring a lot of enthusiasm into any activity. If we can briddle this subpopulation and channel all their energy into various community efforts we would not just enrich the lives of the little ones but also the disadvantaged who, with their free meal, get a chirpy "Happy Friday!" from a little 8th Grader instead of a grouchy splat of food from their usual server.
Last night I also helped out with another food service for homeless people. The volunteers with this group were younger and more educated and work was carried out much more efficiently. Three vans were driven along different routes, stopping about 12 times per route to bring food to different homeless populations around Manhattan. Again, an excellent service and vehicle through which we might be able to reach out to the New York homeless.
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