Operations and Role in Society
Homeless shelters are usually operated by a non-profit agency or a municipal agency, or are associated with a church. They almost always have Section 501(c)3 corporate organization with a Board of Directors pulled from various sectors of the community. Often, such Boards include clergy, elected officials,and even shelter clientele and people from the surrounding community.
Homeless shelters often provide other services to the community at large. The classic example is the soup kitchen for persons who are not staying at the shelter. Others include support groups, and/or substance abuse treatment. If they do not offer any of these services, they can usually refer their clients to agencies that do. Supportive housing integrates services in a more assertive fashion. The typical pathway through the interlocking system is that a person may start in a shelter and move through transitional housing into supportive housing and finally independent housing.
Centers in the United States are also often coordinated with outside programs both for their mission-specific operations and for ancillary services. For communication of their availability, most coordinate with the Federally mandated 2-1-1 or the 3-1-1 phone information system which allow needy persons to find out where shelters are located. For transportation to shelters, some offer free transportation, particularly in cases of persons being released from jail. Some jails have specific staff assigned to placement of persons being released.
Read more about this topic: Homeless Shelter
Famous quotes containing the words operations, role and/or society:
“You can’t have operations without screams. Pain and the knife—they’re inseparable.”
—Jean Scott Rogers. Robert Day. Mr. Blount (Frank Pettingell)
“If women’s role in life is limited solely to housewife/mother, it clearly ends when she can no longer bear more children and the children she has borne leave home.”
—Betty Friedan (20th century)
“A society which is clamoring for choice, which is filled with many articulate groups, each urging its own brand of salvation, its own variety of economic philosophy, will give each new generation no peace until all have chosen or gone under, unable to bear the conditions of choice. The stress is in our civilization.”
—Margaret Mead (1901–1978)