Mobile Homeless Shelters Think Outside the Box

 

The homeless are getting new homes in Los Angeles.

This winter, EDARs (short for Everyone Deserves a Roof) are popping up around the city's homeless communities, according to the Los Angeles Times. It's a contraption that resembles part shopping cart, part tent.

 

The idea for the EDAR was devised by philanthropist and film producer Peter Samuelson, whose credits include "Revenge of the Nerds" and "Arlington Road." After starting the Starlight and Starbright Foundations (they were merged to become the Starlight Starbright Foundation in 2004) to help seriously ill children in need, Samuelson became interested in the plight of Los Angeles' homeless.

Twice-weekly, he'd encounter more and more homeless along his bike riding route. After seeing the cardboard box where one homeless woman spends the night, Samuelson said to himself, "I've got the refrigerator. She's got the box. What is wrong with this picture?"

After realizing the monumental costs of running a brick-and-mortar homeless shelter, Samuelson came up with the idea of a mobile homeless shelter.

 

He sponsored a contest where art school students turned in design ideas. The winner was a mobile shopping-cart apparatus that would hold bottles, cans and other recyclables during the day and then fold out into a sleeping platform with a canvas cover at night.

"I've always believed society is defined by how we deal with our weakest links, the best of America is when we take care of the less fortunate."

 

 

 

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{Check the bottom link for video of the EDAR. It's very imaginative and a definite step up for the homeless. Hollywood is much maligned but the film community is like all the others in that it consists of many types of people. Philanthropist and film producer Peter Samuelson is making a difference and it the sort of difference that counts most. It improves the lives of the homeless on a daily basis. Hopefully the day will come when there are no homeless on the streets of America but until that time arrives people who walk the streets, giving food and water and medical care to the homeless are working in the front trenches of the battle to improve their lives. They are unsung hero's. The EDAR may only be a band-aide but until the problem is dealt with realistically bandages are all we have. Good for Mr Samuelson and his EDAR {Everybody deserves a roof}.