On Thursday the 5th, our poverty group was lucky enough to have scheduled a visit with Coalition for the Homeless. We met with Marisa Butler, the volunteer coordinator, and immediately she gave us a tour of their amazing facility.

When you first walk in, there is a locked door to the right and Emergency Care to the left. This is what they call the First Step Program. Anybody, whether homeless or just living in poverty, can go and get any help they need. The help they can receive help such as meeting with a social worker to getting some soap. I found this amazing because no appointment was needed. Anybody can go at anytime and receive the help they need. Often times if what a client of theirs is looking for is more serious, or in the category of long term help, they will be redirected to a different program. Coalition has programs that pay a month of rent, give permanent housing, meals, job training, computer classes and more. They also have a library in which anybody who is a client of theirs can go and keep one of the books.

I didn’t expect our tour to last as long as it did, but there seemed to have been endless programs that Coalition for the Homeless runs. After our tour, we met with an intern at Coalition, Avonna Zheng. She is a 12th grader living in New York with her brothers and single mother. When Avonna was in 8th grade, she was homeless. Living in a shelter with her family was hard, and what she really stressed to us was that when they were looking for help, no one would give it to them. They went to the police and a load of other organizations and shelters, but there was little help they could offer. This was when Avonna realized that even though there are many places that are supposed to help people, they provided no support.

After this we helped put together bags of candy for their Holiday Party, and sorted the toys for the same event. I found it amazing how few donated toys had been given  to the Coalition for the Homeless. This visit made me realize that even though the programs that the City provide appear to work, they don’t. If they were made to truly help people, there wouldn’t be 22,000 homeless kids living in New York State.