Gladys Tiffany, Director Omni Center for Peace Justice & Ecology
It’s been an intense week of trying to work out schedules and details for all the people of the white house. 30 days was really not a charitable amount of time to ask low income people to make abrupt changes like this.
The while house is empty and the people have moved, thanks to you help. Of the eight, one found a normal apartment without help from you and me. It’s a studio that he’s paying not much more than he was paying before. He had the advantage of being a veteran. He didn’t have to ask for help from the VA, but got that little bit of boost for his service to find a stable place.
The couple with serious health issues didn’t even have money to pay for their friends gas to help them move, so your donations were a real life-saver for them. They moved into a relative’s extra bedroom where what little they can pay will help their family. They also used your donations to rent a storage unit for their belongings.
Two others have a plan to room together, but couldn’t get everything in place before January 10. They have a friend they can stay with for a few days though. Hopefully they’ll get all the details worked out before the friend’s landlord gets too upset at the extra people. That’s never a very stable situation.
There are two that we’ve known for a long time now, who are sharing the spare bedroom at our house. They had a very complicated situation that just couldn’t get worked out in 30 days but they’ll be fine. This seems like the best arrangement for the time being.
That leaves a single renter unaccounted for. The schizophrenic woman was a very tough case. She has no income and is too disorganized to be able to search for housing, make applications, talk to landlords, pay fees and rents, or negotiate any of the complex tasks that renters have to deal with.
She really needs help with managed housing. But there are no capable people she trusts to help her negotiate that. Our short-term plan was to take her and her homeless boyfriend to an extended stay motel for a week while the weather was bad. It’s the best thing we could come up with. But in the end she just couldn’t allow that. She stood in the yard crying and refusing to get into a car to the motel, and finally went off to her boyfriend’s camp.
The next night was really cold. She came back and asked Richard to let her sleep there that night, but he just couldn’t do that by order of the judge. He tried again to take her to the motel but she refused. Who knows what awful things may have happened to that girl in motels?
She’s still in the neighborhood kind of with her boyfriend. Her supportive community has been scattered to the wind and she’s enduring the worst of the winter in the cold woods. What might become of her is similar to many of the 53% disabled and destitute homeless people living rough in Fayetteville. Really. This year’s PIT Count identified that 53% of our homeless people are disabled with one OR MORE disabilities. If this really were a Christian nation Americans would recognize that Jesus just wouldn’t stand for it.
The ”bills” aren’t all in for placing people yet. Putting the first couple into their relative’s house took $800. But we can estimate about $1000 for the 2 remaining clusters of people your money will help. They’ll each pay what they can. We’re holding the rest of the money – $887 that you amazing people have donated – for if the woman shivering in the woods asks for help. If that doesn’t happen, it can go toward legal expenses, which is the other focus of this GoFundMe.
Thank you friends from all over the country and all over the world who are answering this call. Your radiant hearts are the foundation of the new caring and inclusive world that has to emerge if there’s a chance for any of us to survive with our humanity intact.
Gratitude to all of you who’ve donated or might donate later.
Gladys Tiffany
Thank you for keeping 8 People From Becoming Homeless by January 10 !
GoFundMe link: