LANCASTER, S.C. — The City of Lancaster does not have a homeless shelter. When people come to HOPE in Lancaster, a nonprofit that helps with short-term crisis assistance, the agency's workers would normally put them up in hotel rooms for several days or coordinate a stay at homeless shelters in neighboring counties.
Bekah Clawson, the director of HOPE in Lancaster, says she can no longer use those options.
“We have no immediate places to put anybody that’s evicted," Clawson said. "Our surrounding counties have been willing to take people. But now as we call them and say we've got folks and we don't have shelter, they're telling us, 'Well we have our own, we have no room for yours.”
One woman in Lancaster, who wished to remain anonymous, says despite CDC's eviction moratorium, she was evicted in June after living in her home for three years. She says she lost her job last April, and the bills piled up.
"I don't know where I'm going to be from one day to the next," she said. "It's a terrible feeling."
Even though she got a job, she says it's difficult to find places open for renters right now, and even when she does, the eviction on her record keeps landlords from renting to her.
"I just asked for more time," she says.
Time is something Clawson says people are quickly running out of. In January, the total amount that HOPE needed to help everyone asking for help was $30,000 in a month. Now that number is $30,000 a week.
The agency has started a fundraiser, but it knows it can't help everyone.
"We've got a big issue in Lancaster," said Clawson, "But it's not just here. It's all over the country.
Contact Indira Eskieva at ieskieva@wcnc.com and follow her on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram.