Many families experiencing homelessness turn to hotels for housing
CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Hotels are homes for some people living across the Charlotte area, Hassan Hoff is one of them. He spent six months living at Lamplighter Inn with his girlfriend and one year old daughter.
Hoff says he was paying $1,200 a month for a room, but now the City of Charlotte is shutting the property down because it’s considered unsafe after owners failed to fix code violations.
“With this place here ripping people off for their money, then running off and abandoning the place,” Hoff said. “The owner kept coming through, cutting the power, getting the power cut off on us, getting the lights and the water cut off on us. It’s like they didn’t really care about the people.”
Hoff says the price of rent coupled with his low wages made it hard to save up for a real home.
“They got families here. They got kids and children like what is there for us to do,” Hoff asked.
Not all hotels are created equal for housing families experiencing homelessness. At Heal Charlotte off Sugar Creek Road, families in the Housing Stability Program pay $750 dollars a month for a room.
Founder Greg Jackson says the average hotel in the Sugar Creek corridor area charges at least $500 a week.
“That’s why we started this program at this campus,” Jackson said. “Just finding out that so many people are being taken advantage of, that are suffering, and there are people that are profiting off of poverty right now in this city.”
The campus has decent rooms, a market on the property with fresh vegetables, enrichment activities for kids and other services for a path to permanent housing within 90 days.
“We have financial services by Commonwealth. We have parental classes that happen working with moms and talking with moms through their issues. We also have mental health services that are here support services,” Jackson said.
Jackson says the situation at Lamplighter Inn is not isolated.
“It’s basically ‘poverty pimping’ people, making money off of people that are suffering from the systems that exist in this city right now,” Jackson said. “I tend to find out that these private owners, they kind of get away with a lot, and the accountability isn’t high for them.”
People displaced from Lamplighter Inn will be put up in other hotels for 90 days. The city and non profit partners will pay for it.
“I know my plan is to get out of Charlotte because I can’t afford it here,” Hoff said. “I thought I was coming here for something better.”
Heal Charlotte has space for 100 families. Right now, there are 18 rooms available for people with children. Residents at Lamplighter Inn have until December 11th to get out.
