"Broke," The Man Without the Dime

by Edwin A. Brown

THE FIRST STEP.

In every State of the Union, the Legislature should pass a bill giving cities the right, under home rule, to erect and maintain a Municipal Emergency Home. Every city ought to pass an ordinance for the creation and maintenance of such Municipal Emergency Homes, and the budget of the city should contain an appropriation for its maintenance, based on the same reasons on which the appropriation is granted for running the Health Department, Police Department, or any other Department of the Municipal Government.

The ordinance to be passed by the city council ought to create and develop a system that will give protection and opportunity to every honest wandering citizen while sojourning, in search of work, in the community.

In the cities of New York and Boston, an appropriation is made from the public treasury for the care and maintenance of their Municipal Emergency Homes. In Chicago a special budget is created and added to the appropriation of the Police Department. It should properly have been added to the Health Department.