How many homeless kids are there in Tucson?
Wow. What causes a child to become homeless? I’d say the No. 1 thing is domestic violence. No. 2 is eviction due to some kind of breaking in the family. Drugs are the other big cause. What happens if these kids don’t get helped? They go hungry. And it’s much worse in the summer months, when school’s out, because they don’t even get the two good meals they get in school (with the school lunch program). Giving Tree is faith-based. What does that mean in terms of your services? We do not discriminate against any type of person whatsoever in our programs. But our funding sources are primarily from private individuals who don’t believe the government has any business raising children. We allow total religious freedom for our children and our house parents. Nobody’s beating people over the head with a Bible. I really want to stress that. There is no one particular church or denomination helping us. We have the whole range of people. Most of the people who provide support have had a first-han
