this post was submitted on 13 Jan 2024
143 points (96.7% liked)

Ask Lemmy

26980 readers
1231 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions

Please don't post about US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world


Rules: (interactive)


1) Be nice and; have funDoxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them


2) All posts must end with a '?'This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?


3) No spamPlease do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.


4) NSFW is okay, within reasonJust remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].


5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.


Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija


Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

It's going to be very cold over the next few days in my area and I'd like to buy something for the people who are homeless, particularly ones who won't be in a shelter.

For budgeting, there is one shelter in my area for adults and one for children/teenagers. I don't know how many people would not have shelter but in the past, I have planned for 40 people when providing food for people in a shelter.

My budget is about $200 USD; what would be the most useful? thermal blankets? hot food?

Edit: thanks to all who responded. I called the shelter and the most needed items are (1) sleeping bags (2) very warm gloves to prevent frostbite (3) boots

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] cashsky@lemmy.world 22 points 10 months ago (1 children)

You are a good human.

I have heard clean dry socks and shoes are a huge necessity since your extremities get cold the fastest, especially if it's expected to snow or rain.

[–] pineapple_pizza@lemmy.dexlit.xyz 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

+1 I bought new shoes and decided to give my old ones away on the street. Wasn't hard, met some nice and appreciative people. Just watch out for people that obviously aren't your size, they'll just resell

[–] unmagical@lemmy.ml 2 points 10 months ago

They'll just resell

This isn't necessarily true. A lot of encampments develop social roles, there's often someone who can tend to wounds, someone who knows how to cook anything using a wide variety of heat sources, someone that keeps track of the individual needs of everyone else at the camp, someone who can cut hair, someone who collects stuff for distribution within the camp, etc.

In a lot of cases physical donations will end up at the camp and either be shared when possible or redistributed to a specific person that can use it.

There are of course unhoused people that don't make it to camps or who have left camps, and if they resell the boots, so what? You're still helping them.