It’s going to be very cold over the next few days in my area and I’d like to buy something for the people who are homeless, particularly ones who won’t be in a shelter.
For budgeting, there is one shelter in my area for adults and one for children/teenagers. I don’t know how many people would not have shelter but in the past, I have planned for 40 people when providing food for people in a shelter.
My budget is about $200 USD; what would be the most useful? thermal blankets? hot food?
Edit: thanks to all who responded. I called the shelter and the most needed items are (1) sleeping bags (2) very warm gloves to prevent frostbite (3) boots
Honestly? Just give the $200 to the shelter to spend on whatever they think they need. As someone who used to volunteer at a no-kill shelter, everybody wants to donate a bag of dog food but no one wants to donate cash. After a certain point, we were throwing away old stock of unopened dog food because we ran out of storage for it.Edit: completely misread the part about helping people specifically not in a shelter. My main point still stands though, I think most unhoused people would take the cash over material goods.