Everyone Deserves a Roof* *a REAL roof

This past spring break, I was in South Central Los Angeles doing service with several community organizations in the area. One of which was Midnight Mission, a homeless shelter on Skid Row that provides counseling, housing, food, and recovery programs for people who want to get off the streets. Something that they promoted was their courtyard,  an open area for homeless folks to relax and a zone of outreach on behalf of the staff. It also was host to some of these interesting looking enclosures, called EDARs. EDAR stands for Everyone Deserves A Roof, and is a 501c3 noprofit organization that started in South Cenral. In fact, if you watch the video, the background is Midnight Mission. EDAR claims to provide a temporary roof and easy storage for personal belongings. It folds up and can act as a shopping cart as well. 

However, each unit costs $500. At Midnight Mission, it looked like they were only a few and primarily used to provide a safe, separate, space for young mothers to sleep at night. EDAR seems unsustainable and a bandaid solution to the issue of poverty. Critics say that it may just "perpetuate homelessness", to which the founder Peter Samuelson says, "Fine, I agree with you, so do something else. Get off your  behind and build some buildings with beds in them". So what's better, creating something that fixes symptoms of poverty or going after policy that created poverty? What will actually make a difference in the community? 

I think this is a great example Ananya Roy's paradigm: "hubris of benevolence//paralysis of cynicism". With so many nonprofit/charities/aid organizations cropping up, it is easy for us to criticize any initiative that aims to alleviate poverty (this one isn't participatory enough, that one won't garner funding...) At the same time, we can't just delve ahead without thinking about a project's unintended consequences either. While these are two extremes, I think it is also a fine line between if we are hurting or helping. (Refer to To Hell With Good Intentions - Ivan Illich!) 

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If anyone is interested, the program I am in is called Alternative Breaks which focuses on different social issues (immigration rights, food justice, animal welfare, urban health - to name a few) through a critical service-learning model. We spend spring break learning from community partners and serving in a way that is most beneficial to them.