To the editor:

I read with interest your Feb. 18 editorial about duplication of services and the Emergency Food and Shelter Local Board alternating cutting funding for the Jubilee Cafe and the Community Drop-In Center since the one serves a sit-down breakfast twice a week to about a 100 each day and the other serves a continental breakfast five days a week, serving over 13,000 meals last year.

The board should be ashamed, cutting the funding of either using “duplication of services” as an excuse. We’re talking homeless people here; is it really so bad if some of them get a sit-down breakfast and a continental breakfast on the same day? I bet most of them really need to watch their calories!

Besides, the numbers don’t work. The Jubilee serves 100 per day twice a week. The Drop-In Center serves 13,000 in a year. Five days a week times 52 weeks a year equals 260 days. A total of 13,000 divided by 260 equals 50 per day.

What I find baffling is the mind-set that values “efficiency” over serving the needs of the homeless.

Jim Ward,

Lawrence