Posted on 05/09/2009 11:48:32 AM PDT by Steelfish
Homeless, 9, and coping with a hard life
For Brehanna, a loss of school, friends and a beloved stuffed animal
PORTLAND, Ore. - At first, 9-year-old Brehanna didn't seem to understand.
Her family was being evicted from their home in Tualatin, a Portland suburb. Her father, Joe Ledesma, a homebuilder for 20 years, was without a job and couldn't find another. He couldn't pay the $800 rent on the three-bedroom house where he, his wife Heidi and daughter lived.
And he couldn't get through to Brehanna as they packed the family's navy blue 1986 Pontiac Firebird that she would not be able to bring her bed. She would not be able to bring every toy or trinket, or that checkered desk she had spent hours painting and sanding, either.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Look like a two hundred drill in the background. Maybe he should consider selling it.
My heart is bleeding, but wait, a home builder for 20 years....hmmmm, he didn’t save any money for a rainy day (or year)....his wife isn’t able to work either......sounds kinda fishy....unless he has other problems that weren’t mentioned. I didn’t read the article, but when I see that it leads with a homeless child, well, if it bleeds, it leads....
A 20 year home builder that rents???? Hmmm!
Tough crowd today...
I feel badly this happens in todays America. Maybe the family could have planned better, but if we’re going to have Big Gummint, then by damn let them give families like this a hand “up”, rather than pissing money away for solar panels on bureaucrat office buildings.
Read the article... he was basically just a laborer making $17 an hour.
Well, you do become somewhat jaded... the “disabled” wife certainly raises some alarm bells... there are sooooo many people making bogus disability claims in order to collect welfare.
Run of the mill “boo hoo” story.
Pretty soon, all Americans will hit the “sympathy horizon” after which these terrible stories have no affect on our emotions.
It isn’t that I don’t care — I do. But there are millions of Ledesmas and they will be taken care of better than in any country in the world.
Why didn’t they forgo toys and the like and build a “rainy day fund?” I have 8 months income in a CD — not easy to do and I have had to forgo a lot. My TV is 12 years old, my video system doesn’t do Blu-Ray. The only nod of the cap to anything new is my computer, which is a bit new but, for example, doesn’t have BlueTooth.
My mortgage has always been well within my means. I didn’t buy anything larger than my income could afford.
You don’t plan for the future and then you want the Gummit to fix everything.
And the gummit is us.
Using children as a shield to protect people who don’t plan correctly is the lowest of all the low editorial approaches.
These are the Joe Plumbers that help build our country. Plan all one wants and invest in companies run by crooks who get bailed out by taxpayers dollars whose execs are then rewarded by taxpayer bailouts while little children are rendered homeless through no fault of their own- Something not wrong with this picture? This is Obama’s America?
You know, that empty house is going to sit there, and sit there, maybe forever. Banks should consider making some sort of arrangement with owners who meet certain qualifications, have a good history of making their payments, etc., to allow them to live there, keep up the house, and begin payments when they can. It would keep the neighborhood’s home values up, there would be one less family without a home, and banks don’t need yet another empty house.
I think ‘homebuilder’ is a bit of a stretch. More like he was a basic framer, and moved with the flow of business.
As a young lad, my father (a carpenter by trade) often took framing jobs to make ends meet, when the commercial jobs he worked were coming to completion.
It’s a job that likely has been very seriously hammered in this economy. I wish these folks nothing but the best of luck.
He should have taken a course to learn Spanish. Maybe said when asked at a job site: "Social Security number? I don't have a Social Security number. I don't need no stinkin' Social Security number!."
Believe it or not, some people work hard, forgo pleasures and toys, save, and still find themselves in deep financial waters. Remember, you may have put aside eight months’ worth of savings, but in eight months without work those savings will be gone. Don’t find fault unless you’ve been there and done that with a disabled member of the family and a crummy, exhausting job.
I can see you really have a soft spot for people. Whatever the cause, homeless families are not a good thing.
I hope you get laid off and can’t find work, perhaps then you’ll understand that life isn’t as simple as you think.
At the least, I would think they could find a friend or relative who would let the child stay with them for a few months, while the couple got back on their feet. If they don’t know a single person in the world that would do that small favor for them, then they have much bigger problems than losing a job.
This is no more a “run of the mill boo-hoo” story than those who lost their savings in the Great Depression. The irony here is that those who caused this financial crisis get bailed out by our tax-dollars and to add insult to injury their execs receive million dollar bonuses. Little children in these types of situations are the innocent victims of criminal financial activity where corporate leaders line the pockets of the Dodds, Franks, Raines, Murtha’s and hundreds of our corrupt legislators and leaders including 0.
I’m floored that anyone only making $17 an hour would rent somewhere where the rent is $800 a month. YIKES! We have never bought any place that cost more than $400 a month and we make much more than he does. Either they tried to live in a very expensive area they couldn’t afford or they were very bad about money issues?
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