Bizarre encounter with "Homeless Issue" volunteer.

[Renew Deal]

I was walking down 5th Ave. in NYC yesterday right across the street from Tiffany's and Trump Tower. It was around 28º yesterday. I came around a corner and saw a woman wrapped in blankets, with no hat, shivering, up against a garbage can, and holding a cup for money. This lady looked like she was in bad shape. Just down the block not more than 60 feet away was a guy with a black hoodie that said "HOMELESS ISSUE" on it. He had a bucket for money. It's common to see guys from a "charity" raising money for the homeless on the street.

I walked by and asked him why he wasn't helping the woman on the street. He said that she's a scammer and she's always out there. I said that if she's a scammer, then he is too. I said that it was way too cold for someone to pull that stunt in that way. He basically went on that she is a hustler, etc., etc. I was really upset by this and I let him know it. If he's serious about being a homeless advocate, he'd do something to get her off the street!

Part of the problem in NYC is that even the homeless charities aren't trustworthy. Here's a story from last year:

One of my first days on the job at my office on E.42nd Street, back in 2001, one of my co-workers saw me stuff a dollar into the jar of the "volunteer" for the United Homeless Organization that was outside our building every day, next door to Grand Central. "Hey, that's a scam," he confided. "Those guys rent the table from UHO for something like $25 a day. Anything else, they get to keep." Everyday we watched the hundreds of dollars pour into the guy's jug from sympathetic commuters. The same guy, every day. We could often hear his robotic chants from our 16th floor office. "Your spare change will feed somebody tonight. Help to feed the homeless." Today, finally, NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo called the UHO out as a sham organization.

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2009/11/nycs-homeless-scam.html

This entire episode is sickening. I wonder if I should do something more about it.

[Joanne98]

1. Most charities are scams. I don't know why anybody gives them money.

[MedicalAdmin]

4. I rarely give money to charities that claim to help...

But I do give to the places and people who actually do the helping.

I especially don't buy candy or other fundraising shit from kids because usually less than 40% of the proceeds go to the kids. It's better to just write a check to the program that needs the funds.

[AlabamaLibrul]

5. At risk of derailing the thread:

am I the only person who has an issue with the candy bar kids?

The school is basically offering a private company free salespeople in exchange for a kickback on the profit. There's nothing particularly good or altruistic about it, and if the borderline coercion of the young salespeople (if you've had a kid in school when these "fund raisers" come around, you know what I mean - free crappy fiber optic light or radio from China if you sell $500 of bullshit) wasn't considered "voluntary fund raising", it'd be illegal.

[Celtic Raven]

7. Told the schools

our family wouldn't be participating in the forced sales.

One year we received a new promotion every 5 weeks. The children were expected to work for those cheap trinkets so I sent an Oriental Trading Co catalog to school with my kid. When the other kids saw that they could order a gross of the trinkets they were interested in for about $10 they quit doing the sales. The parents I heard from were relieved.

[MedicalAdmin]

10. I used to be a band director.

I always did fundraising but I rarely did sales. We did a figgy pudding christmas concert that had music and desert at $10 a ticket. Groups of kids would get together and would compete for the best "theme" table for a cash prize as well as not having to carry an instrument or set up at pep band games (a get out of work free benefit). We asked directly for contributions from the community. We provided musicians to play for military funerals (the legion kicked back by writing out a check every year). Most of what I did in terms of fundraising had something to do with getting the kids more experience with their instuments or helping other kids or teaching other kids. This included the fact that older kids were "allowed" to apply for and get a "job" teaching lessons to beginning students in our feeder programs which was a twofer in that the younger kids got attention from the older kids, the older kids had to know what the heck they were doing and so tended to pratice more, and I had less work to do. I guess that's a threefer.

The reason was that sales have such a low ROA. Seriously? 40% is usually the MOST that these companies offer kids for hauking their crap. What a freakin rip off.

[notesdev]

2. I lived in NYC a good long time

and sad to say there are people who pretend to be homeless in order to solicit money

I gave some cash to someone one time and didn't realize until afterward that he was wearing a nicer jacket than I had!

And there was a woman who maintained an apartment on Park Avenue by this method as well.

[Renew Deal]

3. I don't dispute that.

And I don't doubt that it's possible in this case, but it's hard to believe. Maybe yesterday was such a bad day that she'll really rake in the cash. I don't buy it.

[SidDithers]

6. Stephen King wrote a story called Blind Willie....

in the book Hearts in Atlantis, about a Vietnam vet who disguises himself as a blind beggar in NYC, and takes in thousands of dollars a day in donations.

Don't know how realistic it is, but I enjoyed the story (and the book)

Sid

[The Backlash Cometh]

8. Talk about scams.

My mother died on Christmas eve. A month later we were donating her clothes to a charity. They said to back the car up in the back and unload. I saw at least a thousand Christmas wrapped packages thrown in a pile. They were donated toys. Some were labeled by the age which was appropriate for the child.

[KamaAina]

9. Those guys work the lines waiting to get into Broadway shows

seriesly. :eyes: