Yikes. Last night saw the Adelaide instillment of the St Vincent de Paul’s CEO Sleepout, the annual event where head honchos of companies great and small raise money (and their profile) for homeless people.
There’s no doubt that, as a money-raising effort, it’s a fantastic event – last night, 120 CEOs raised $560,000 for St Vinnies, which is none-too-shabby a number.
But as last night made clear, there’s something a bit off about it, too.
“The homeless people were demanding in one instance, ‘can you give us some money’, and in other instances ‘what are you doing here? Don’t think you know what homelessness is like because you’re sleeping out for a night,” St Vinnies CEO David Wark told 891 ABC Adelaide.
@CEOSleepout in Adelaide is well underway. Great turn out for a great cause! pic.twitter.com/mtypAjWsXW
— Vinnies SA (@VinniesSA) June 16, 2016
“They certainly stayed and made their presence felt and then occupied a seat or two for maybe 15 or 20 minutes, but that’s okay, that’s a real experience and that’s what we’re trying to provide people that are doing it.”
@NathanBazley @CEOSleepout yes chief got a little damp & moist but 1 night vs every night, there’s no comparison pic.twitter.com/uTHZRkM8E6
— Jarrad Mortimer (@jmort77) June 16, 2016
But Wark said they didn’t put the marquees and fences in the area where they’d usually spend the night, and perhaps it just took them by “surprise”.
