Well, my sister used to work at the Centre of Hope here in Calgary for a few years, and she said the good majority of the clients that came in were from the Maritimes and Saskatchewan, coming to Alberta with little to nothing in their pockets, in hopes of collecting in on some of the massive amount of money the province is making. They don't realize that yeah, you can make $10.00 an hour at Burger King, but you're also going to have to pay a mortage/rent, utilities, and buy food in a city that's not exactly affordable to live in.
New York has always had a high amount of poverty, though. The city is, what, 12 million people? I've heard that New York proper is the same size as Calgary in terms of it's urban sprawl. That's a lot of people in one confined area. New York isn't exactly an affordable city to live in, itself.
This guy is only doing those homeless people a favour. At least the time spent in court will get them off of the street for a couple of hours. They'll probably get a decent meal or two out of the whole works, too.
|