PHOTO/AMY DAVILA
CHICAGO, IL — Lindsay Gerhardt founded Humans For Hope in December of 2016. This organization sets up carts or tables full of donations to give away to homeless people living on the streets of Chicago. They set up anywhere they can, sometimes popping up on downtown corners where they know homeless people will be. They call these events Gives. But the giving that takes place is a lot more then useful items like food, clothes, and medical supplies. Relationships are formed and the volunteers and the people living on the street are building strong bonds and community together.
“Everyone in my crew has been through really bad hardships and the same with me. We want to help because we see we could be there [on the streets],” explains Lindsay. In fact Lindsay says that the difficult medical conditions she suffers with “helped me connect and feel even more for individuals having to be on the streets because it makes life that much harder.”
There are many charitable organizations in the city of Chicago, but what makes Humans for Hope different is the vision of this group, the community spirit they are working to build. Gerhardt explains the ideas behind the Gives like this: “For me, it has never been about helping ‘the homeless’ but more so, just connecting with a new person, giving what I could and exploring new perspectives as we both spoke of our stories. I have always seen that these individuals on the streets are just humans, like everyone else, not monsters or bothersome as society treats them. We are them. They are us. They are simply in a different situation than us, a situation that I have seen to be the hardest of them all.”
“Gives allow us to see the truths and raw reality that society likes to cover up. The men and women I have met are some of the strongest, most genuine and giving souls who have some of the most traumatic, heart wrenching stories you would ever hear and yet they are made to be invisible from society. They are walked by and shut out for no reason but their status. Every person we meet and every story we hear on our Gives educates us and reassures our thinking that homelessness can happen to everyone and anyone. We all should band together and help one another because these are someone’s brothers, mothers, sisters, etc.”
Lindsay and Humans for Hope have embraced the People’s Tribune as a true voice of and advocate for the homeless. One thing that she said drew her to the People’s Tribune was this sentence, “Whether we are renters, homeowners, or homeless—we all need to join together with one voice on this issue to demand that ‘we the people’ be guaranteed housing no matter what our income!”
You can donate to Humans For Hope at Gofundme.com/humansforhope, you can contact them at humansforhopechicago@gmail.com or through Facebook and Instagram.
