I’ve been covering America’s homeless crisis at Vox all year. Last month, a reader reached out to ask what practical step they could take to help the people they see sleeping on the streets, besides giving time to food drives and occasionally handing out a drink on their walk from the store. “I often feel helpless to enact change,” the reader said.
I had some ideas but decided this was an important question to answer thoroughly, including challenging my initial assumptions about what would be most helpful. So I reached out to leading national and local experts on homelessness to get their thoughts.