This revolutionary app makes it easier than ever to help the homeless
Homelessness is a deep-rooted problem that effects our entire nation. We often pass homeless people on the street -- sometimes scrounging for money and sometimes ignoring them altogether -- but this app changes everything.
New York City recorded an all-time high of 59,000 homeless people in 2014, and a group of software developers in New York recognized the ever-growing and decided to do something about it. Thus, WeShelter was created.
Ilya Lyashevsky, a co-creator of WeShelter told Fast Company, "It really started with us living in New York City, and, unfortunately, seeing a large number of people living on the streets."
%shareLinks-quote="All of us sort of had the same reaction, which was we felt terrible about it, and we wanted to do something about it, but we didn't really have a good way to act on the impulse in the moment." type="quote" author="Ilya Lyashevsky" authordesc="Co-creator of WeShelter" isquoteoftheday="false%
With WeShelter, you can donate to the homeless from the comfort of your phone, with just a few taps of your finger. It's never been easier.
It's super user-friendly and simple: Every time you walk past someone who is living on the street, you tap a button in the app, which then triggers a corporate sponsor to give a donation to a local homeless service organization. You can also use WeShelter to call the city's homeless outreach operator if someone needs help immediately.
While the donations usually come out to about five cents per tap, you can occasionally choose to give more by sharing on social media, and of course, if enough people use the app, it'll make a huge difference.
With that being said, the founders made it clear that they don't see this app as a means of replacing the traditional path and process of giving.
"Really it's about engagement and getting everybody in on solving the problem. You have millions of people walking around New York seeing people in desperate straits, and they're not doing anything," Lyashevsky said. "We don't think it's because they're hard-hearted. It's just that they feel there's nothing they could do."
While the app currently only works in New York City -- where homelessness is a huge problem -- WeShelter hopes to expand to other cities in the future. This app is groundbreaking. More than ever, there's no excuse to not help the homeless.
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