Those of you that are regular visitors to the site know this entire project got started because of the fact that we were always getting panhandled.  Going to our office, walking to lunch, even sitting in the park just trying to relax, we got panhandled.  It didn’t seem to matter how much we gave to the street people, they were on the street every day asking for more spare change – or in some cases – demanding a dollar.

A few days ago, we sat drinking coffee in a local coffee shop (not a chain) that still allows people to smoke.  We talked about the next set of stories for the site, hyped up on espresso, cigarettes and lack of sleep.  We wondered what would happen if we tried a little experiment.  What would happen if we collected change from all the visitors to our website and gave it to just one charity program, in one city, that was trying to solve homelessness.  Don’t worry, we are not going soft.  We just thought it would be an interesting concept; one big check representing all the change that people would have given to panhandlers given instead to one organization.  Plus, we get a twisted thrill from the idea of our website writing a check to aid organization.  It would be like Mel Gibson attending Temple.

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Obviously we never thought we would get love letters after launching Street-People.com. This is not a politically correct site and our stories are not sympathetic. We have been getting the submissions we expected from college students, pictures from travelers, e-mails from people recounting their street people experiences after they discover the site, and the occasional "you are assholes and this is mean" e-mail.

What we didn't expect, however, was to be contacted by a relative of one of the people featured on our site. It seems that Jeff and Kelley, our Rock 103 bums, have family in the area. Contrary to what Jeff told us, he has parents, an ex-wife and some offspring that live in the area. They have viewed the site and contacted us. I was skeptical at first because most of the information the person provided after claiming they where Jeff’s child was stuff that could have been pulled from the website. But after exchanging some e-mails, I think this person might be the real deal. Mainly because they gave up a phone number for Jeff’s ex-wife.

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