fuTuRe sHOcK

The Star
…tent cities have sprung up in Seattle, San Diego, Fresno, Calif.; Columbus, Ohio and Chattanooga, Tenn. In Seattle, where as many as 150 homeless persons have been moving around to thwart authorities, they have dubbed their community Nickelsville, named for Mayor Greg Nickels.

“It was the damndest thing I’ve ever gone through,” said 44-year-old Dan Foley who lived three weeks in Reno’s tent city. “You couldn’t sleep at night. There was no curfew, no quiet time. Everyone was drinking or coughing or getting high or talking about getting high.” Foley is thinking of heading to San Diego, maybe linking up with a brother in North Carolina, in search of work. “This is a casino town. If you’re not hooked up with them, you’re dead,” he says.

On this day, Jessica Seitz, a 29-year-old mother of four, was looking for whatever she could get for her children at a second-hand store near the tent city site. She and her husband, Matt, moved to Reno from nearby Carson City in May because they could no longer afford the rent and the gas needed for the 30-minute commute. “We’re trying to make it,” she said as she strapped nine-year-old Alyssa, seven-year-old Cameron, four-year-old Autumn and two-year-old Logan into a borrowed van. “My husband works his butt off, but he’s making $12 an hour in a warehouse. You can’t keep going as a family of six on $12 per hour.” More

Tags: Calif, depression, homeless, Hoovervilles, Nevada, Ohio, Seattle, Tenn, Tent cities