What Helps The Homeless

I just recently got off the street. I was able to pay down debt, resolve various personal problems and develop a portable income while homeless. The secret sauce here is that I had a virtual life. In spite of my station in life and inability to make myself publically presentable enough for networking in person, participating in online forums allowed me to make social connections (with people who weren't total losers -- many homeless people hang out with other homeless people, getting high and entrenching their problems). Making connections online also got around other logistical barriers to participating in polite society. Meeting people in person requires traveling to the meeting spot, having your act together enough to be at a certain place at a certain time and there are usually costs. Even just having coffee with someone means paying for coffee. This can be a hardship when you are homeless. I also was able to earn money online and handle quite a lot of other things that woul...

I would like to see programs that promote mobility of homeless individuals, such as help with applying for the disability discount card for the transit system. This is the opposite of the current tendency for centralized homeless services, which creates a concentration of poverty that compounds problems and makes it harder to escape. When I was in downtown San Diego, it cost $2.50 for a one way bus ticket or $5 for a day pass. After they switched to a Compass card, it went up to effectively $7 if you didn't have a card to put it on. The cards cost $2 as well. We used a lot of spray peroxide while on the street. You can get a spray bottle of peroxide for a dollar something at Walmart. It is over $3 at CVS Pharmacy. There is no Walmart in downtown San Diego, but there are CVS Pharmacy locations. It made no sense to spend $5-$7 on bus fare to try to save $2 or so on this item. With being homeless, we could not stock up on cheap stuff to make it make sense. So we were paying over $3 ...