18,000 municipal workers are part of NYC homeless initiative

De Blasio announces NYC’s new outreach program for the homeless

Mayor Bill de Blasio announced “Outreach NYC,” on Thursday, a new program designed to help combat the city’s homelessness problem.

NEW YORK (AP) — New York City will direct more than 18,000 municipal employees to give social service workers real-time information about homeless people living on the streets.

Workers from the departments of parks, sanitation, buildings, fire and health will be trained to use an app to send details to a new homeless services joint command center.

According to The New York Times, outreach workers will then begin the often time-consuming process of persuading the homeless people to accept services and shelter.

An estimated 4,000 people live on the city’s streets.

Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio has committed $19 million to hire about 200 new outreach workers, bringing the total to around 600.

Giselle Routhier of the Coalition for the Homeless says the 24/7 initiative seems like “mass surveillance of homeless people.”

___

Information from: The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com