Last summer, Seattle counted twelve thousand homeless residents, the highest number ever recorded in its annual count. Seattle also added about twelve thousand apartment units last year.

It’s like a line from an old seafaring poem: Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink.

But rest easy, Seattle’s tech wizards are here to disrupt homelessness. A new app called Samaritan allows Seattle’s housed population to donate to their homeless neighbors. It works like this: Samaritan gives homeless people who sign up for its service “beacons,” bluetooth-enabled devices worn like necklaces. Samaritan app users are alerted on their smartphones when they pass someone wearing a beacon.