In Jackson’s case, a clerk at a hotel saw her and her children parked behind the building and connected her with Family Promise, a Jacksonville nonprofit that changed her life. If you’re older you may have a disability and may not be able to do that work,” Gilman said.Īnyone can experience homelessness, but there are resources to help. “They’re unlikely able to get a second job, right, if you already have kids, you have to have someone to watch your kids. But wages haven’t gone up at nearly the same rate.Īs this trend continues, there’s a growing concern for people ages 55 and over and families with young children can end up without a place to live. So, they are working but they do not make enough money to pay for rent and all the other necessities,” Gilman said.Īccording to recent data, home prices and rents in Jacksonville have gone up nearly 50% since 2018. “30 to 50 percent of people experiencing homelessness have a job. Right now, there are dozens of people experiencing what Jackson went through.ĭawn Gilman with Changing Homelessness said a majority of those experiencing homelessness are everyday people who just can’t afford rent. “I said ‘If you don’t send someone today, I’m not going to make it. At her wit’s end, with no family around and no place to go, she prayed and prayed. She never imagined that she would spend the next chapter of her life living out of a car with her three children. She said she tried to reunite her family and reconcile her marriage with her husband who relocated here. Jackson moved to Jacksonville from New Jersey. “You never as a wife and a mother would think that, you know, something like this could happen, but it does,” Jackson said. She said last July, on her birthday, she and her children were left homeless after her husband abandoned them. That’s what happened to Jasmine Jackson, a single mother of three. Dawn Gilman with Changing Homelessness said a large majority of people who are homeless have jobs and are active members of society. The local nonprofit found that 71% of the people surveyed became homeless because they could not afford to make ends meet.ĭowntown Jacksonville is a common area for the homeless to gather, but the people you see living on the street only make up only a small percentage of the unhoused population in our area. – More than half of the homeless population in our region recently lost their home, according to a recent survey by Changing Homelessness.

Download earthbound 2