Living, hidden, in storage lockers
This is part of the #HiddenDE campaign, which seeks to reveal the hidden issue of family homelessness in Delaware. 1 in 30 kids experience homelessness each year in Delaware—sign up to learn more.
A manager at Delaware’s Central Park Mini Storage said that several people, including families, have been living in their units, according to Rob Petree at Delaware 105.9.
The company evicts renters when they find them living in their units, said the manager, who gave her name as Vicky. In one instance, Vicky said, “we called them and they’re like ‘well, we’re in between places,’ and I said ‘I’m sorry about that, like I’m really sorry.’ I looked up some homeless places for them because I don’t want them to be homeless, but they can’t stay in our facility.”
This is not a unique situation. Other local storage companies in Delaware have also found renters living in their units, a phenomenon that Christina Showalter, executive director of Housing Alliance Delaware, blamed on a lack of affordable housing.
In Delaware, working at minimum wage, you’d need more than 2 full time jobs just to afford a 1-bedroom apartment. Though storage units may be much smaller and lack necessities like plumbing and electricity, they cost far less.
This issue rose to national prominence earlier this month after Boston shut down a storage facility when city inspectors discovered that several people were living there. Though this is not a new phenomenon — a front-page Washington Post article from 2004 already found it to be relatively commonplace — Google search data indicates that interest in the subject is rising.
What happens when families are discovered? Often, the parents are arrested. In one notable case in 2014, a mom and two sons began living in a storage unit during what the mom, Sheena Jackson, called a “desperate situation.” While Jackson searched for jobs, her family bounced between a domestic violence shelter, spare bedrooms, and various hotels. “It really hit me so hard, that I’m down at about the tree-root’s-bottom,” she said.
With resources dwindling, Sheena said their “only option was to stay where our stuff is” — a 5-by–10-foot storage locker that cost about $60 a month. Police eventually discovered her kids there, and she was charged with child endangerment. After her arrest, her kids were taken to foster care and she was held on a $50,000 bond — which “might be $50 million for all her ability to pay it,” said her public defender. Community members quickly raised funds to bail her out and support her kids, and she was released from jail a month later. Eventually, Sheena was sentenced to 4 years of probation.
When people are perceived to be living in a storage unit by choice, though, the reception has been very different. Last year, a man who had given up his apartment to hike the entire West Coast decided, once he finished, to live in his car, then his storage unit. His how-to video on living in a storage unit has garnered 5.3 million views on YouTube, and his experience was described as a “lavish life of luxury”, “genius”, “fascinating” , “enviable,” and “a modern home”.
Delaware currently has a shortage of over 20,000 affordable homes needed for low-income renters, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. Until we build long-term solutions to these fundamental causes of homelessness, families will often do anything it takes to keep a roof over their kids’ heads — even if it means living in a storage locker.
Click here to get email updates like this from the #HiddenDE campaign. Follow the campaign on Instagram (@HiddenDE) to reveal hidden messages about family homelessness. Want to take action? Click here to see how you can end family homelessness.
Presented by Family Promise® of Northern New Castle County, a 501(c)3 nonprofit dedicated to ending family homelessness in Delaware. For more information, contact Ryan Catalani at ryan@familypromisede.org.
