Cardboard Box City Event Raises Homeless Awareness
By MICHAEL BECKER Chronicle Staff Writer
September 29, 2007 — Marcella Babineaux never thought she would become homeless.
SEAN SPERRY/CHRONICLE Mike Edwards readies a cardboard lean-too for the night at the Bogert Park Pavilion, Friday during the Cardboard Box City 2007 sponsored by Family Promise. Yet after she was forced to leave her Northern California home suddenly in the early 1990s, Babineaux found herself without enough money to rent a new home.
"I was in pure panic," Babineaux, now 62, said. She ended up living in her car in Point Reyes National Seashore for three months, bathing at a youth hostel, washing her clothes at a friend's home and trying to earn her way back into a home. "You take for granted running water and a bathroom," she said.
Babineaux was one of 105 registered participants at the Cardboard Box City 2007 in Bogert Park Friday night.
The event, sponsored by Family Promise of Gallatin Valley, asked volunteers to spend one night living in a cardboard box to raise both money for and awareness of the area's homeless population.
At Thanksgiving, it is traditionally time to count our blessings and share what we have with the people around us. For the 472 trained volunteers with Family Promise of Gallatin Valley, these are not idle words, but a real commitment to live by. Each and every day since Family Promise opened its doors to homeless families on March 10th, volunteers
have been busy making dinner, helping with children, sleeping overnight in churches, and doing whatever is needed to make life a little bit better for those less fortunate. While some people talk about unity or justice or helping the poor, there are 18 churches right here – right now — that are doing more than talking about it. [Read Complete Article] [See Article from the paper]
"Promise Fulfilled" — Great Article about Family Promise in Sunday, 11/19 Chronicle
Tom Sullivan
In today's Chronicle is a wonderful article written by Ted Sullivan which describes our program and details a family's experience with us. This article will be a great one to be able to share our program with many who are still unaware. This should do wonders for raising the general awareness of Family Promise around Bozeman.
When the article is posted on the Chronicle's website, we'll have a link here.
Affordable housing is the latest promise voiced by politicians and officials in the Gallatin Valley. It is a must-have on any campaign platform and in any planning meeting. Last week, Bozeman's Commission ranked it at the top of the city's priorities for the next year.
With housing prices climbing constantly and already unreachable for many residents, talk of affordable (the correct way to say "low cost") housing is a guaranteed attention-getter.
But what to do about it? Some want city and county government to demand affordable housing as part of any subdivision. Builders want fewer government demands, which add to the cost of housing. Brows furrow, hands wring and the price of housing jumps another thou.
Fortunately, one Bozeman group rolled up its collective sleeves and tackled the toughest end of the problem. [Read more at the Bozeman Daily Chronicle]
Some forms of homelessness are hidden from plain view.
A parent with no savings loses her job, then her apartment. The next thing you know, she is living with her children in the family room of her friend's apartment or in her car, struggling to get her life back together. She has a roof over her head, but she is homeless and so are her kids.
A new nonprofit organization in Bozeman is seeking to help Gallatin Valley families who suddenly find themselves in similar situations.
[Read More at the Bozeman Daily Chronicle]