Posted on 05/11/2014 8:43:13 AM PDT by JoeProBono
MADISON, Wisconsin (Reuters) - After surviving two long, cold Wisconsin winters on the streets, Betty Ybarra traded freezing park benches and tents for a tiny house made of recycled wood she helped build herself. Her 99-square-foot home, which boasts flower window boxes, was built by volunteers of the Occupy Madison group, as part of about a half dozen similar projects around the United States, including in New York and Texas, to shelter the homeless. "We can check on our flowers and we can now try to live a normal life," said Ybarra, 49, who shares her new home with her friend Chris Derrick, 55, who had also been homeless.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Bias. The homelessness are obviously due to the Tea Party (somehow.)
Yeah. The problem requires more of a solution than building sheds.
It will also be interesting to see the first interaction between Occupy Madison and a zoning board, or the board of health. You live by the sword...
Yeah. I work in Boston and see the regular panhandlers every day. Last week I noticed one talking on his cell phone.
He’d be better off with a simple NEED MONEY FOR BEER sign. Guy in West Hollywood was doing really well with that.
Good luck with your adventure! I am still quite young at 59 (I think anyway) and not ready to quit yet. If we had had the money when we were young we would’ve been long gone. Now we have the money and I can’t get him out of his chair. Go figure.
I’d say I was pretty poor by US standards, but by, say, Ethiopian?.. That’s what I’m saying. By OUR standards anybody making $10.50 an hour is ‘poor’. However, if you have ever seen (and I hope to God you never will) people in the Phillipines, VN, Rwanda, Nigeria and India, you might want to hand them $100.00 worth of Ramen Noodles. They would be good for two years, I’d wager. I haven’t been back to Rhodesia, one of the lushest richest countries I was ever in, until the Communists took over. My sources tell me now the people can’t hunt, gather or glean because of the abominable state of the farmlands.
Oh, that is sad. I’d say the worst thing I’ve seen were beggar women and children in Portugal who were Middle Eastern. A lot of them were burned. Apparently men burn their daughters on purpose because they get more money as beggars, looking as pitiful as they do.
Until I read this I didn’t realize we had any homeless. I thought they all went away in 2009.
My community gets a lot of these people -- drifters, transient, restless types who don't know what they want or, the minute they get bored or disillusioned with something, disappear at the drop of a hat & move somewhere else.
For this reason, when looking for roommates/tenants, I will not consider anyone over 35 (or even 30). An older, mature woman needs her own place, or she can be the landlady (like me) & call the shots. Someone older who had uprooted herself in search of spirituality / fame / fortune -- and shows up asking for a place to live, I flatly tell them no.
Hah! Nice.
That was my dream for a long time as well. I was lucky enough to get my wife to share that dream and we almost succeeded. We are moving onto a floating home instead of a boat so I'll chalk that up as a win.
As long as there is water around you its all good. Congrats!!
Curious, being a float house how does the ownership work with regards to it being
on a public lake. Do you have to lease that part from the lake ownership?
I’ve met many women over 35 who’ve had to find alternative housing quickly after leaving an abusive husband. Some people need a break in life until they can regroup and become independent.
It’s in a marina harbor and we rent the buoy location from them. Norris Lake in Tennessee has about 1800 floating houses of various sizes and qualities.
I love it!!! Good for you.
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