All Hands on Deck vs. Homelessness

Last night, despite a sustained economic recovery, more than 56,000 New Yorkers slept in a shelter. Among them were 23,000 children who will soon head to their first day of school with one hand tied behind their back.

No one is blameless for this human catastrophe: not the federal government, which has slashed funding for public housing and social services; not the state, which has balked at fully funding a joint city-state rental assistance program; and not the city, which continues to approach the crisis of homelessness as if it were an unforeseeable emergency.