Chattanooga’s Union Gospel Mission is kicking off a facility expansion and reminding us all of the power of giving to those in need this holiday season.

"For years, the statistic has been [that] most people are about three days away from homelessness, or three days away from hunger, at least, and I think that continues to be the case,” says Reverend Jon Rector, Executive Director with the Union Gospel Mission.

Here in Chattanooga, we’ve seen a 12% increase in this year's point-in-time count compared to last year's. Rector says that means that at any given point, we can find hundreds to thousands of people living in homelessness on Chattanooga’s streets.

We saw those numbers take form just last week during the Union Gospel Mission’s annual Thanksgiving dinner.

“We normally serve between

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