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David Peery knows what it’s like to live on the streets of Miami. For nearly a decade, he shuffled between shelters and slept on the streets, caught in the abyss of homelessness that felt impossible to escape. Today, Peery is an advocate, working to reform the very system that once left him behind.
In 2021, Peery co-founded the Miami Coalition to Advance Racial Equity, or MCARE, a grassroots organization dedicated to addressing systemic disparities in housing, income and health care. He has organized protests and rallies at Miami-Dade’s Government Center, challenging policies that perpetuate homelessness. His advocacy isn’t theoretical—it’s lived experience.
“Each day that you’re homeless, you sink further and further into it, and it gets harder to get out,” he said.
Peery’s descent into homelessness began in 2008 when he lost his job during the Great Recession. With no family or social safety net, he bounced between shelters, but quickly learned their limitations.
“Shelters are effective for people experiencing temporary homelessness due to an emergency like job loss or medical issues,” he said. “But for those who are chronically homeless—on the streets for a year or more—shelters don’t work. They just recycle people in and out, and eventually, you get banned.”
By 2012, he was sleeping on the streets. His life changed when he learned that the city of Miami was trying to modify the Pottinger Consent Decree, a landmark agreement that protected homeless people from being arrested for sleeping on the streets. Peery reached out to attorney Benjamin “Benji” Waxman, offering his perspective. Waxman encouraged him to become the lead plaintiff in the case.
The legal battle resulted in protections for unhoused individuals, and for Peery, it introduced him to advocacy. Three years later, he co-founded MCARE.
“Our power structure blames the victims of the system, but homelessness is not an individual failure; it’s the result of systemic inequities,” he said.
The biggest issue, he argues, is housing. Miami’s skyrocketing rent—where studio apartments average over $2,000—makes stable housing nearly unattainable for low-wage workers.
“You can be homeless while working a full-time job,” Peery said.
He recalled his own experience working at an Amazon warehouse, packaging groceries and being a personal shopper.
Peery, now 67, grew up in Chicago in a lower-middle-class family. He later moved to Washington, D.C., where he attended George Washington University Law School. Even with his education and skills, breaking out of homelessness was a challenge.
The turning point came not through employment, but through aging into eligibility for Social Security.
“It wasn’t some big victory. I just turned 62,” he said.
Today, Peery has a room in a cooperative housing unit in downtown Miami, in the same building where MCARE operates. Though he has a roof over his head, he admits, “part of me is still on the streets.”
That feeling drives his work every day, whether he’s organizing rallies, connecting homeless individuals with resources, or pushing for policy reforms. Health care is another focus of MCARE’s mission.
“If you don’t work, you don’t have insurance,” Peery said. “Your only option is to get sick and die.”
He believes that housing and health care should be treated as human rights, not commodities. One strategy he has identified is increasing voter participation.
“Politicians ignore the working class because they don’t vote,” Peery said.
To combat this, MCARE partners with third-party voter registration groups at every public event they organize. Looking back, Peery is proud of MCARE’s role in protecting the rights of Miami’s unhoused community. Yet, he knows the fight isn’t over.
“The government knows how to end homelessness. They have the resources,” he said. “What’s missing is the will to act.”
