We recognize that the poor, hungry and homeless population that constitutes the majority of Soup Kitchen guests has a tremendous need for information and assistance that can help them sustain and improve their lives beyond just the provision of a meal.  Our Counseling and Referrals (C&R) services help guests with needs such as those for shelter, clothing, food pantry, alcohol and drug rehabilitation, AIDS prevention and treatment information, employment, and obtaining public benefits.  Many of these sessions involve supplying identification cards and transit assistance that will enable guests to get to other services.  Open each weekday from 10:00 a.m. to 12: 30 p.m., our C&R trailer is manned by two C&R counselors each weekday.  These C&R counselors are specially trained volunteers who hold individual sessions wtih guests to help with information, counseling and referrals.  We also have a full-time Counseling Assistant.  Less tangibly, but just as significantly, our C&R staff often provide an antidote to the bureaucracy, rudeness, and indifference that characterize so many of our guests' interactions with "the system".