A GRANDMOTHER is facing homelessness after her entire mobile home community was evicted from the neighborhood.
Residents of Walnut Lane mobile home community in Moab, Utah were told that they have until the end of June to vacate the area.
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Melva Cruz has lived in her home in Walnut Lane with her entire family for 15 years.
“It’s not the nicest place, but it’s cheap,” Cruz told FOX 13, a local Fox affiliate.
“We have everything that we need. We wanna stay here. We don’t wanna leave,” she added.
“I love Moab,” Cruz said. “I’ve been here so long. My kids grew up here. They don’t wanna go, I don’t wanna go, we wanna stay here.”
Cruz, along with the 25 other mobile homes in the community, received a notice a few days prior telling her she has two months to leave her trailer, which she owns.
“I started crying,” Cruz said. “I was like, ‘where am I gonna go?’ It’s hard.”
“It’s hard because I don’t have a place to take my grandkid to be honest, I don’t have a place to take them. We live together because that’s how we can help each other. Moab it’s like, it’s so expensive. I don’t have $8000 to go rent a place. I don’t.”
The city purchased a mobile home park in 2018 for $2 million intending to turn it into an affordable housing development.
However, six years later there’s not only no development, but no immediate plans for one, as well.
“We were notified in March that the insurer was no longer going to cover [Walnut Lane]. It was going to be excluded from our policy, and so we are just scrambling now to figure out what to do,” said interim city manager David Everitt.
“We have explored every possible option, but unfortunately, the loss of insurance coverage creates unacceptable risks for both Walnut Lane residents and the city,” wrote Everitt in his letter to residents explaining the news.
“After reviewing all these considerations, the City of Moab has concluded that we can no longer continue this arrangement and must end your month-to-month rental agreement,” he said.
“We realize this situation is challenging, and we sincerely regret the difficulty of these circumstances.”
We have everything that we need. We wanna stay here. We don’t want to leave.
Melva Cruz
The city council held meetings for Walnut Lane residents on Friday to explain the situation further and notify them about the assistance package they’ll receive, as well as connecting them to further resources.
All residents of the community will receive $10,000 to help with moving costs if they are out by June 30, with the city promising to do everything they can to assist in finding housing.
Cruz says she can’t afford to move her trailer, which she is responsible for as owner, along with her family and pets.
While many of the residents of the community rent their homes from the city, the ones who own it, like Cruz, face incredibly high moving costs, since many mobile homes are not in fact, actually designed to be mobile.
The cost of moving mobile homes can be very expensive, ranging from $5,000 to $20,000, depending on the size of the home and the distance of the move, the U.S. Sun has previously reported.
Residents told Fox 13 that it was too short notice to move and they don’t feel like they have enough time.
“When we saw the notice, they give us just two months to be out. It’s kind of shocking because they know Moab. Everybody does. Housing is really hard,” said resident Juan Carlos Medina Garcia.
“Most [people] in two months, you’re not gonna find a place in two months.”
David Everitt said that “like much of the state,” Moab is “experiencing a housing shortage.”
“Ours is even worse,” he added. “It’s exacerbated by the fact that there’s not a lot of stock here at all. We’re surrounded by public lands.”
Cruz fears it will be difficult to find a place where she can afford to live in Moab.
“They should have not bought the place and lied to us,” she said.
“They promised us housing, better apartments, and they haven’t done anything,” Cruz added.
“I can’t become homeless with my grandkid, my kids. They all grew up in that trailer.”
A GoFundMe page has been set up to help the residents and families of Walnut Lane.
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