Social workers in Tennant Creek are regularly seeing children out on the streets after midnight, and often eat their main meal of the day at the Barkly Regional Council's After Hours Youth Centre.
Children are often bussed between the homes of family members until social workers find a house with a family member that is not intoxicated.
Each night the centre feeds around 70 children, where they also play sports and music, and create art projects before they are given a lift home.
The centre's $240,000 annual NT Government budget only extends to being able to respond to the town's problems of poverty, welfare reliance and overcrowded housing.