Recovered from FSRN’s earlier site via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. The audio here is FSRN’s own production recording. Originally published July 30, 2009.
In New York, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is offering one-way plane tickets to homeless people who will return to their home towns or home countries. The program has been around since 2007, but it's now receiving criticism from advocacy groups that say it fails to address the problems that made people homeless in the first place. Bloomberg defends the relocation scheme, saying it is less expensive than spending up to $36,000 a year to keep a family in a homeless shelter.
The Federal Government along with policy makers and activists are also talking about homeless programs. The government is allocating more than $1 billion in stimulus money to programs that aim to prevent homelessness in the first place. The White House has other ideas about how to keep people off the streets. FSRN´s Karen Miller has more.
