Five Kids, One Hotel Room to Call Home

by Mark Horvath · 2010-09-08 10:00:00 UTC
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After walking out of this hotel room I broke down. To be honest, I don't know how Jean does it all. She tries to be a good mother to her five children. Every day, even in the Missouri rain, she rides a bicycle several miles to her minimum wage job. But minimum wage is not enough for the family to break the weekly rate hotel cycle.

These are the invisible people we need to make visible. Luckily, this family and many others found a very kind man in St. Charles County that is helping homeless families get back on their feet. I have traveled all over this country visiting people in hotels. Thanks to Paul Kruse these families are staying in a fairly decent place. But it's still not home.

Many of the affordable, weekly rate hotels are run down. Most places are filled with drug dealers, criminal activity and are unfit for children. It's a vicious cycle of homelessness because while paying to stay at these hotels it's nearly impossible to save for first and last month's rent to get out of the situation.

Jean once had a home, a car and a better life for her family. Unfortunately, we are going to see more families losing everything and facing homelessness.

I am glad that we have people like Paul taking real action to help people. We need more to step up. We need you!

Mark Horvath is an activist for the homeless. He vlogs at invisiblepeople.tv and blogs at hardlynormal.com. He was formerly homeless in Hollywood.
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