There are now about 40 such newspapers across the U.S. and 10 in Canada, from none only a decade ago. The first street persons' newspaper in the world was the Street News in New York City, established in 1989 when a benefit concert for the homeless was cancelled and organizers found themselves with a whole lot of benefactors' money and nothing to spend it on. They began the Street News , put copies of it in the hands of homeless people to sell at a small markup, and a movement was born. Roughly half of the delegates at the conference, Harris estimates, were once homeless themselves. It's a relationship formed on parity, not charity.
People see that homeless people are full humanity.
Street papers are a very important part of that. Proponents of the latter think the more money these papers generate, the better the position they'll be in to help the homeless by providing jobs or funds for housing. The introduction of The Big Issue in Los Angeles last April became the lightning rod for this conflict and was hotly debated at the conference. With full coffers from its parent company, it's now competing directly with Making Change , a homeless people's newspaper that's been sold in Santa Monica and L.A. since last year. But Big Issue 's founder John Bird insisted to delegates that his intentions were good.