There was a genuine passion in his voice as he spoke about meeting the youth and the lessons he s learned from them. Street kids, he said, have taught him a great deal about values and what s important in life, and he feels honored to be working with them. I go out on the streets and see all these kids who have such amazing strength that it brings me to tears, Weinberger said. Thirteen kids a day die in the streets that are put in unmarked graves, and that s not something I can sleep with. He said he wouldn t stop working with street kids until the problem no longer existed.
Homeless youth are usually on the streets because of sexual or physical abuse at home.
A lot of the kids have been really hurt and scarred from different things that they ve seen, and experiences that they ve had, said Weinberger. The program makes a long-term commitment to the youth. Outreach teams go out into the same communities on the same nights every week so that they can develop a relationship with the young people. Most of the time, the youth have discovered that life on the street has its own set of hardships and are ready to have someone help them out. It can t be easy persuading a homeless teenager to live in any kind of home or to be a part of society.