Care For the Homeless

 For more information about the event--including this year's Honorary Co-Chairs--please visit our web site . To reserve tickets by phone, please call the Development Office at (212) 366-4459.

Mayor Bill de Blasio was elected on a “Tale of Two Cities” – one incredibly rich and privileged and one poor or struggling and losing ground. Care for the Homeless works every day to deliver life changing services to the most vulnerable families and individuals struggling daily in New York City. As part of our advocacy for our clients we’re participating in a national conversation about economic inequality in America and what can be done about it. Join us for a special screening of the film Inequality for All This week, on Thursday, February 27 th , Care for the Homeless and our client leaders are sponsoring a showing of the movie “Inequality for All” and an open discussion following the screening. The program begins at 5 p.m. in the CFH conference room on the 5 th floor of 30 E. 33 rd Street.  If you want to join us please e-mail policy@cfhnyc.org because seating is limited. The award-winning movie Inequality for All is based on a course Dr. Robert Reich, form...

Over 170 homeless women participated in last month's Pocketbooks for Paps campaign. This campaign was born a few years ago when a very generous donor gifted us with a large container of handbags. Our Health Education Team devised a creative way to distribute the donation by creating a health awareness campaign. During Cervical Cancer Awareness Month in January, the team provided educational workshops to over 170 women, with 22% receiving their exam that same day. All participants "shopped" at the end of the workshop for a new pocketbook or handbag. "There are so many misconceptions associated with detection, prevention and treatment," says Gillian Saunders, CFH Senior Health Educator. "I met a young woman in her early 20s who was hesitant and scared at the prospect of receiving her first pelvic exam. Donations like the pocketbooks really help us break down barriers to care." Do you have a new or gently used pocketbook or han...

Jeff Foreman, Director of Policy For the past year, Care for the Homeless client leaders and our certified client advocates have fought for extending a “30% rent cap” to all people living with HIV/AIDS in city subsidized HASA (HIV/AIDS Services Administration) housing programs. So it was with extreme pleasure that we got the word last week that the Mayor and Governor have jointly taken action to guarantee the 30% rent cap to more than 10,000 New Yorkers in HASA housing. Mayor de Blasio hailed the city-state effort, and so do we! Unlike most extremely low income housing and subsidized housing for poor households with disabilities, HASA housing never guaranteed a 30% rent cap. It always should have. Governor Cuomo said, “By implementing a 30% income cap for low-income renters with HIV/AIDS, we are protecting New Yorkers in need and making our communities stronger, healthier, and more compassionate for all.” Our client advocates spoke out for this most recently Wednesday mor...

Jeff Foreman, Director of Policy “57,000 is 57,000 too many.” That’s what the sign said that a Care for the Homeless client leader held up   last year at a rally (featured   here ) on the steps of New York’s City Hall, after the media brought us the bad news that we’d set yet another record for the number of people experiencing homelessness in New York City shelters. Last year over 111,000 people spent time in our city’s homeless shelters. More than 40,000 of them were children. Those figures, too, represent new high census figures for shelter populations. Another way to think about it is that in HUD’s recently released Point-in-Time survey for a given day in January of 2013, there were 64,060 people in New York City’s homeless shelters or living on the streets. That’s a 13% increase in City homelessness, year-over-year, at the same time the country as a whole decreased homelessness by 4%.   That study found about 1-in-10 homeless people in America was in New Yor...

Jeff Foreman, Director of Policy We can end modern day homelessness in New York City. And here’s the interesting thing, we know how to do it, doing it promises better outcomes and a second chance for the 55-64,000 people who will sleep in city homeless shelters or on the New York City streets tonight and the cost of doing it isn’t higher than what we’re doing right now. What’s more, with a very supportive city administration and City Council, the timing is right to do it! Most advocates and the de Blasio administration agree New York City needs to reinstate two vitally needed programs that city government ended while they were working! First is the use of a small portion of our city’s federal housing resources – NYCHA public housing apartments and Section 8 housing rent vouchers – to help fight homelessness. Second is a housing subsidy targeted to move people experiencing homelessness from shelters to affordable housing. Care for the Homeless also believes more affordable h...