Homeless people needing bus or train tickets

[Crashj007]

Originally Posted by triwing

That was a joke... wasn't trying to elicit a serious response.

Poe's law says satire is impossible to detect, for many people who start out too serious. That's why God made smileys.

[Crashj007]

Part of the reason the stories repeat is that many of them travel in groups. Here we had a collection of actually down and out unemployables and someone organized them, gave them assigned intersections, and drove them out and picked them up each evening. Taught them all the same set of sad stories and they did okay for a while. Finally between the cops hassling them and Winter, such as it is here, they moved south.

[johnnyjay1970]

people in our lifetime born in the 50s 60s 70s and some 80s all donated paid taxes. im not saying that your not helping. buy just how much money goto people in need. but where does your money go? what foundation. people who really need get shut down quick so how2 much do you think goes back in the community?

[Monacles]

Originally Posted by johnnyjay1970

not everyone says they are stranded and telling a false story. So for anyone to say that you have a computer or internet doesn't mean they can sell it. their is welfare smart phones now. I know, I made a bad choice by relocating and now I am at a stand still and close to homeless with no way of making money. I even went to day labor and it was a joke. people fighting, cheap people avoiding going in office so the person next in line could get work for the day. its rough out here anymore. people only care about themselves. I was born in 1970 and raised to have a heart. but our youth today is so spoiled and rotten think life is easy. And the ones born with a silver spoon in there mouth mow a days.

I agree, there are probably people really trying to get home or trying to move on to a place where they can get help or work. The problem is that those folks are the minority and I've yet to come across any. If you're in downtown Fort Worth trying to get on a bus or train then you'd likely be at a train or bus station. Often times people buy day passes and end up throwing them away when they are done. That's a free ride you could get basically out of the trash.

Often the people asking for money for tickets/passes run the same scam. They say all the same things, have the same props and run the same technique of overselling and talking forever like they think I'll give them something just to shut up and go away. Unfortunately it's the biggest giveaway that it's a scam because they all do it.

[Randylounsbery]

I am a Homeless person trying to get a bus ticket back to Tampa Florida where I have a place to live and work please help me get back to my family and job please

[the_little_truth_writer]

Originally Posted by Randylounsbery

I am a Homeless person trying to get a bus ticket back to Tampa Florida where I have a place to live and work please help me get back to my family and job please

Why are you in Fort Worth? If you have a home and a job waiting for you in Florida, do you not have family and friends who can help get you a bus ticket home?

[the_little_truth_writer]

For anyone who cares to go back in this thread, I have an earlier post wherein I mentioned a woman in her late 50s who is in very bad health, who was facing divorce, foreclosure on her home, and homelessness. I would like to update her situation.

Firstly, let me reiterate that this woman has never used drugs and probably has had fewer than ten alcoholic drinks in her entire lifetime.

The day after her daughter's 18th birthday, her estranged husband had her served with divorce papers. She could not afford an attorney, so she basically relied on the court to do the fair thing, but as there was not much in the way of assets, she did not get anything. The house was in her name, but it was months behind in payments. For reasons unknown to me, the mortgage company left she and her daughter remain there for about four years before they finally perfected foreclosure and evicted them. She had found work with a retail establishment making slightly more than minimum wage. Her hours were generally 20 per week or less. She and her daughter had nowhere to go upon eviction. I rescued their old dog and kept him here with me for a few weeks. They literally hung-out at the park anytime she was not working. The daughter was unable to find work. She had been at university but was forced to drop out due to the homeless situation. They went to some churches for help, and one church referred them to an apartment complex that might be willing to lease something to them. That was more than a year ago now.

As it happened, there were two managers there at that time. One was there helping out whilst she awaited assignment to manage her own complex. This manager argued in favour of allowing the woman and her daughter to sign a lease on a tiny one bedroom apartment. The other manager was against it. The woman (let us call her Lily for purposes of this story) sat in the outer office listening to the two managers argue rather loudly. Finally, the one who favoured giving Lily a lease won. The complex gave Lily a lease even though her income was not even twice the monthly rent. She and her daughter still live there. The daughter has had an occasional job but nothing steady. Lily's health has continued to deteriorate. Every time I see her I expect it may be the last time. A few months ago her hours at work were cut. She fell behind two months in the rent and was about to be three months behind. This happened just before her lease was to renew, so she did not renew the lease. The apartment complex left her on month to month rent payments which included a substantial increase in rent because she was on month to month. She came very close to eviction. She managed to find help to get the rent caught up, and she convinced them to credit back all of the late fees, etc. However, her living situation is still very tenuous.

Lily works every hour she can get. She has put in more job applications all over the area than I could count in an afternoon. She has been trying to get help with updating her job skills. She has not had much luck. She still relies on the atrocious Fort Worth bus system to get around. The doctors at JPS have done little but send her for one test after another for the last 3-4 years, and they are still sending her for tests. She misses work to go downtown for tests. The buses literally take her hours to go perhaps 10 miles round trip. The doctors have identified several health problems including a degenerative bone disease, a broken back, high blood pressure, something called GURD, major depression, severe anxiety (who would not be depressed and anxious in her situation?), etc., etc. There have been so many things identified that I have lost track. However, they are not doing anything about it, which amazes me no end. All they do is send her for more tests and more tests. In one instance they told her they identified X problem, but her level was a hair below the level at which they would intervene with an Rx. Her doctor, whom I met and thought was a pretty decent doctor, told Lily that "if it were up to me, I would give you the Rx right now, but it is not my decision." I know you must be thinking, well, if it is not her doctor's decision, then whose decision is it?

Well, folks, if you have ever heard horror stories about JPS (I have heard many which I know to be 100% true), here is one reason why. Lily's doctor is only allowed to send her for certain tests and to prescribe certain drugs should Lily need them, for example, the doctor can prescribe an antibiotic if Lily gets an infection. However, most things are in the hands of a committe of doctors and administrators who are over Lily's doctor. In fact, this is true of all the doctors who see patients at JPS. They are all constrained in what they can do to help their patients. Now, you may or may not agree with me, but I feel such decisions as to whether or not someone's test results warrant an Rx should be between the doctor and the patient and not a committee of doctors and administrators who have never even met the patient. However, this is how state medical facilities are operated, and I have often pondered why this should be so? Are they afraid their doctors are incompetent to prescribe a medication? I do not understand it. Nevertheless, Lily has no insurance and no money to see a doctor in private practise, so she is on an never ending merry-go-round of test after test and doctor's appointment after doctor's appointment with no help. Meanwhilst, her health declines further and further, and her job/financial/housing situation is tenuous at best.

Lily's future is bleak at best. She is less than ten years away from the traditional age of retirement, but she has nothing to retire on. She literally lives hand to mouth. If possible, in some ways, her daughter's future looks even bleaker. She does not have enough skills to get a decent job that would at least be enough to pay for the necessities of life. Since she has only been able to find a couple of part time jobs, neither of which were permanent, she cannot pay off her accumulated student debt, and since she cannot pay off her accumulated student debt, she cannot get any further student loan assistance to go back to school to earn a degree that might serve as a path to some sort of career. She is also suffering from major depression as well as pretty severe social anxiety. She is almost 22 years old now with virtually no job and no real job skills. Like her mother Lily, she has no social life whatsoever, and there does not appear to be a path out of this situation. She is pretty much chained to her sick mother, and together they live in a tiny one bedroom apartment that they could lose at any moment, and if they lost the apartment, they literally have no where to go. They would be homeless. The daughter, by the way, has never used drugs or even had one alcoholic drink in her entire life. Her mother sheltered her from everything as she was growing up. So, neither Lily nor her daughter is a drug user, a drinker, or even a smoker. They could not afford cigarettes even if they wanted them, and they do not want them.

The upshot is that there are good, decent, hardworking people in our own city who cannot get a toehold out of grinding poverty. Their social captial is nil. The "help" out there is virtually non-existent. There are very few options for people like this, and quite honestly, I can see why some of them turn to crime, not that I believe Lily or her daughter ever would do. Their futures are bleak indeed, and as much as I am pained to say it, I foresee Lily's future as one of continued declining heath until she is physically unable to work at all, and at that point, she will indeed be homeless. There is an old saying that "not all ____ are created equal." You fill in the blank. It can very easily read "not all homeless people are created equal." So, do not be too quick to judge the next time you see a homeless person or someone begs a dollar or two from you. Consider, you could easily be on the other side of the equation if only a tiny fraction of the variables in your own life situation were changed.