The problem comes in with just who gets to define "destitute" and what criteria they use. There are a lot of people who think destitute is no cable, cell phone, or high speed internet. I hear what you're saying, but we need to make sure of what our standards will be. We also need differeniate between those who can't and those who won't, because a number of those who are "destitute" are that way because they won't help themselves, not because they can't.
With an economic catastrophe like we are facing, there may be well over 50% unemployment. As with the Great Depression, willingness and ability to work will become meaningless when there are no jobs.
In the GD, the government tried to provide the jobs, but that was just a bandage. This time, probably the best bet would be for each State to issue their own ‘scrip’ currency, with much of their citizenry doing what amounts to day labor in what are currently legitimate jobs, in exchange for room and board.
It turns the whole concept on its ear. Whatever your job is, keep doing it but being paid only in scrip. The State will temporarily keep you in shelter and give you food, and you can use the scrip to buy whatever else you need from local businesses.
This is economic “treading water” during massive unemployment. It is phased out when mutually supportive businesses start making real money profits again, enough to replace some of the scrip they are paying with dollars. The scrip has primed the pump to get back into a normal economy.
The idea is to keep people in shelter and with food until market forces can get running again. Scrip will protect them from dollar fluctuations and shortages, local businesses will still have their production and distribution channels, and people will still be buying their stuff.
Good management comes in ways like motivating people to maintain their shelter, the State using its concentrated dollars to buy products not made in the State, like pharmaceuticals, and keeping tight control over scrip wages and prices.