Posted on January 25, 2016 by John Surico in Vice Vice, By John Surico For New York City’s record-high number of homeless men, women, and children, the winter of 2015 was especially brutal. A constant barrage of snow slammed the city almost weekly, causing hundreds of those sleeping on the streets to seek refuge in “cardboard condos,” and on subway cars, preferably away from the gaze of police officers who threatened to pass them along to overflowing shelters and hospitals. Frozen, and with numbers of homeless rising to Great Depression levels, the city’s outreach budget basically doubled overnight. The winter of 2016 was shaping out to be relatively better. Temperatures in NYC were worriedly warm for weeks on end, so much so that Christmas Day felt more like Memorial Day here. Drops to freezing temperatures were rare, and there was no snow in sight. The homeless, as it would seem, had finally caught a break.
