> In my interactions I was genuinely surprised by the really large percentage of homeless who preferred to live on the streets (even in the winter) over decent

> In my interactions I was genuinely surprised by the really large percentage of homeless who preferred to live on the streets (even in the winter) over decent shelters without many of these risks, because of pets not being allowed. For many the companionship with the pets are quite literally keeping them sane, and there’s no way they’d give them up, and yet the vast majority of shelters have a no pet policy (again, understandable, but it still is a contributing problem). The few shelters I've looked into have a huge list of rules that are strictly enforced which quickly turned me away. And they were in old, run down, dirty buildings. It almost seemed like they didn't want anybody to use the shelters, and very few appeared to be using them.