Step One in working with the homeless should be contacting the homeless person's family, not to overtly pressure them to take the person back into their home, but to make a check to see if the family would allow the person back. I don't know that they should be overly pressured though, as they might have reason for having kicked the individual out.
This I say in light of a quote from Todd Thatcher I read last week: "It is not insignificant that we refer to people as homeless rather than houseless."
In some cases, the homeless leave their homes of their own choice. So, you also make a check to see if the person is willing to go back.
Most everybody has family, even if it is extended family instead of immediate family. There are some who don't, but most everyone does. If someone is homeless then, it is because they have left their family. We speak of the family being the basic unit of society. I is interesting, then, that if we are to solve one of the basic problems in our society, part of the answer lies in reuniting families.
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