(CITY LIMITS) David Brand, December 22, 2022

An annual vigil honored the New Yorkers who died on the streets and in shelters while highlighting the lethal impact of chronic homelessness. “We should be clear that these outcomes are the result of public policy choices we make in the United States,” said one of the organizers.

For six months, Judy Romer lived on the ground, huddling in Herald Square while forming a bond with two other women who slept beside her. But over the past year, both women died, Romer said. So did four other close friends who were also experiencing homelessness.

On Thursday night, Romer remembered her friends Cassidy and Carol, along with “Jose the Dancer,” Arthur and “Scotty from the Upper West Side,” during an annual Homeless Persons Memorial Day vigil inside a Midtown church, adding their names to a list of at least 300 homeless New Yorkers who died this year.

“We’re falling through the cracks,” said Romer, who now stays in a Lower Manhattan shelter. She said she became homeless after she was evicted following her husband’s death. “It’s devastating.”

The December observance is organized each year by the service providers Care For the Homeless and Urban Pathways, whose staff compile names and as much information as possible about people who died in the streets and subways, in shelters, or, at times, shortly after securing permanent housing. Their goal is to honor the lives lost and to shine a light on the systemic inequities and austerity policies that deprive people of stable housing while fostering illness and death.

Source: City Limits