#when I was homeless in Idaho winter

[adrienschat]

*screaming on the top of my lungs* that’s not what Jesus would have wanted

(Venting in tags)

[techcrunchappcom]

New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/hundreds-of-thousands-without-power-in-northwest-ice-storm-national-news/

Hundreds of thousands without power in Northwest ice storm | National News

LAKE OSWEGO, Ore. (AP) — A winter storm blanketed the Pacific Northwest with ice and snow Saturday, leaving hundreds of thousands of people without power and disrupting travel across the region.

Freezing rain left roads, power lines and trees coated in ice in the Portland, Oregon, region, and by Saturday morning more than 270,000 people were without power. The extreme conditions, loss of power and transportation problems prompted Oregon Gov. Kate Brown to declare a state of emergency Saturday afternoon.

“Crews are out in full force now and are coordinating with local emergency response teams on communications for emergency services, such as warming centers,” Brown said in a statement. “I’m committed to making state resources available to ensure crews have the resources they need on the ground.”

Winter storms and extreme cold affected much of the western U.S., particularly endangering homeless communities. Volunteers and shelter staffers were trying to ensure homeless residents in Casper, Wyoming, were indoors as the National Weather Service warned of wind chill reaching as much as 35 degrees below zero over the weekend. Authorities in western Washington and western Oregon opened warming shelters in an effort to protect homeless residents from the wet and cold.

The power outages in the Portland region could extend throughout the weekend for some, said Elizabeth Lattanner, a spokeswoman for PGE, one of the major electricity providers in the region.

“In storms like these, restoration takes time given all of the challenges our crews face in getting to restoration sites and repairing those outages,” Lattanner said. “We have more than 600 PGE and contract personnel responding to the storm — it’s all hands on deck.”

Many ice-laden trees snapped under the weight, falling on power lines and causing transformers to blow out in showers of blue and orange sparks. By noon Saturday, more than 1,200 PGE power lines were down, Lattanner said.

Brian Zevenbergen watched Saturday as a crew sawed up two large, ice-covered trees that had crashed across his driveway overnight, narrowly missing two cars parked there. His house in Lake Owego had also lost power overnight. Just around the corner, another massive tree blocked the street in the suburb south of Portland and had taken out a city street light.

“Last night, everything was standing, and this morning the two trees had me blocked in the driveway and were blocking at least half the street,” he said. “Friends on the lower levels have power so I have invites to go hang out there.”

The ice and lost power didn’t stop children from rejoicing at a second straight day of sledding in a place that rarely sees sustained snowfall. Residents blocked streets with cones and shooed snowplows away so kids could sled down ice-slicked hills.

The ice and snowfall caused treacherous driving conditions, forcing Oregon transportation officials to close Interstate 84 in the Columbia River Gorge, and the regional transit agency TriMet suspended all bus and train service in the region.

TriMet spokesperson Tia York asked people to avoid all travel unless it’s an emergency. “It is too dangerous out there,” York wrote in a statement.

Police in Salem, Oregon, also warned residents in Marion and Polk counties to watch for downed power lines and falling tree limbs, and the Oregon State Police said fallen trees blocked several roads across the region.

Some Washington state residents were also socked in by the weather, with snow falling throughout the Seattle region on Saturday morning and freezing rain falling along the coast in Grays Harbor County. The city of Seattle activated its Emergency Operations Center Saturday morning to coordinate the city’s winter storm response.

Heavy snowfall also led to dangerous driving conditions in parts of eastern Oregon and southwestern Idaho, with Malheur County, Oregon, and Boise, Idaho, expected to get as much as 6 inches (15 centimeters) of snow by Saturday afternoon.

The National Weather Service said all three states should brace for another surge of winter moisture to hit the Northwest Sunday night, potentially leading to more heavy snowfall through Monday. The “unsettled winter conditions” would likely continue throughout the week, the National Weather Service said Saturday morning.

Western Washington was expected to get an additional 3 to 6 inches (8 to 15 cm) of snow on Saturday, with another 2 inches (5 cm) possible on Sunday and Monday. Rain falling on accumulated snow raised the possibility of urban flooding happening Sunday night or Monday in some areas, according to the National Weather Service.

The heavy snow made for dangerous avalanche conditions in the many areas across the Olympics and Cascades mountain ranges, with large avalanches possible. Officials with the Payette Avalanche Center in west-central Idaho also warned of increasing avalanche risk in the days ahead.

Idaho’s neighbors to the east were blasted by brutally frigid weather, with the National Weather Service warning of dangerous wind chills in Montana and Wyoming. The wind chills were expected to reach as low as 50 degrees below zero in Billings and near Missoula, Montana, and nearly as low across parts of Wyoming.

Wind chills that low can cause frostbite on exposed skin in just a few minutes. The bitter cold was expected to last throughout the weekend.

The National Weather Service warned that the wind chill could be dangerous for pets and young livestock, at a time when calving season is beginning for many cattle ranchers.

The Colorado Avalanche Information Center also warned of dangerous avalanche conditions in zones around Apsen, Steamboat and Flat Tops, Grand Mesa and Gunnison. Frigid temperatures with lows below zero were expected to last through Monday morning in Denver and across the Colorado plains, according to the the National Weather Service.

Boone reported from Boise, Idaho.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

[thenonconformistcurmudgeon]

Into the Heartland

As a member of the Northeast intellectual elite, I have been trying to understand the political and cultural heartland by reading newspapers in States such as Idaho, North Dakota, and Iowa.  Frankly, it has not helped in bridging the gap of our world views.   They are proud of their prized bulls for bucking rodeo contests in North Dakota and who wouldn’t be.  I did come across a piece on the teen of the week in the Peace Garden State.  It was too saccharin sweet of a profile for the likes of me.  

The teen I came across was an attractive blonde, laying out in the grass, white dress, practical shoes.  Of course, she has dedicated her life to helping those in need with her passion for serving others.  She is described as a natural leader that remains humble and kind.  Her long list of accomplishments include but I’m sure not limited to: at age 13, raising funds through dancing for the Parkinson’s association and later becoming the youngest Parkinson’s support group board member in history.  In 2018, she became North Dakota’s outstanding teen for visiting hospitals, raising funds and organizing events for the Children’s Miracle Network.  In 2019, she was voted the President of the North Dakota Association of student councils and it was no surprise to me as she had been on student councils since elementary school.  Through this work, she founded the first walk to end Alzheimers team.  Other awards include the National Honor Society Volunteer of the Year, Distinguished Young Woman of North Dakota for 2021 but only an honoree for the Spirit of Community North Dakota High School student.  Guess she fell down on the job on that one but I am truly impressed with being given a future award for a year that hasn’t happened yet.  President of the school choir and jazz ensemble, has a 4.0 GPA and won the AP Scholar of Honor award. To find balance and help her juggle her academics with involvements, she turns to prayer. When struggling with the stress of all her leadership positions, she reminds herself that it is her mission to serve others.

While reading this profile, my 16-year old self emerges and I experience revulsion to her do-gooder life.  She makes me sick.  How can anyone be that saintly?  Got to be something deeply disturbed about her.  I imagine it is all a cover for underlying darkness.  While making fluffernutter sandwiches for the infirmed children, perchance she is lacing them with poison?  Perhaps, she is filming threesomes with basketball players or dealing drugs out of the high school newspaper room?  She secretly blows up all the pottery of other students in ceramics class while hers comes out of the Kiln perfectly?  She is found mainlining homeless vets under the bridge and her Woman of the year award for 2021 is taken away?

Or maybe she is truly that good.  Virginal, dating the quarterback, checking on the elderly stuck at home, planting flowers at the local nursing home, baking pies for the church supper, making posters for the high school hallways on the danger of smoking, and emceeing at the local rodeo.  

I got it, perhaps she will rebel when she experiences college and is exposed to a wider and more jaundiced world view.  My desires are dashed however, as the article goes on to indicate she will be attending the University of Mary in Bismarck ND, a catholic school. I researched the school and upcoming events include cookie decorating and an etiquette dinner.  The etiquette dinner is described as a hands on learning presentation by Callista Gould a regional expert on etiquette. Students will have the opportunity to both hear her presentation and then practice what they have learned with a 3-course full meal.

My hopes for our martyr’s transformation scamper away. College can’t even get someone from far away to widen the view of proper etiquette.  I’m sure our righteous local hero will start a bobbing for apples fundraiser for those afflicted with the heartbreak of psoriasis and a Republicans for Celibacy club at the college.  

I’m certain now that post college, she will marry her sweetheart, Biff, who will be the president of a bank, have a side cattle ranch, and be the local leader of the Rotary. Besides any career she chooses for herself which she will be inordinately successful in as well as personally rewarding,  she will be busy making peanut butter and jelly on white bread sandwiches for the unfortunate, finding time to sew doilies for those in need, knitting scarfs for the local giraffes at the zoo for the harsh plains winter, grinding up and pureeing meat for edentulous strays, and endless other humanitarian endeavors.

While trying to understand others, the only thing I discovered was my own darkness, gloominess and jaded perspective of humankind.  Guess my heart of darkness shouldn’t be surprising to me or you faithless readers.  

I have decided to reform!  I will toil at being less jaded, bitter, and more open to the possibility of wholesomeness. My first step in this reclamation project was to sign up for the Tip of the Week at the Culture and Manners Institute headed by the one and only Callista Gould, noted above.  Perhaps it will assist me in stopping my enthusiastic musings about when our young hero turns 49.  I foresee her twin girls going off to college, the son being old enough to care for himself, and she decides to run away.  In this scenario, the husband gained weight, has been having serial affairs with the bank tellers and has a way too young gender amorphous person on the side in the oil boomtown of Williston. His arrest for embezzlement will soon come to pass.  Our benevolent hero on the lam turns to robbing banks while wearing a girl scout uniform and beret with her outlaw paramour and she learns the word irony.  Before crossing the border into Mexico, she sacrifices lambs to the gods of avarice and debauchery.

OK, reform, un-blackening the heart, it’s a process.  

[csrgood]

A Decade of Care: Hanes Launches 10th National Sock Drive to Help the Homeless; Tops 3 Million Donated Pairs

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C., November 22, 2019 /3BL Media/ – Small gifts often have the most meaning.

For the millions of people living homeless, a clean pair of socks is often described as “the gift of humanity.” Hanes, America’s No. 1 basic apparel, underwear and sock brand, is partnering with organizations fighting homelessness nationwide to deliver comfort to those who need it most through the Hanes National Sock Drive. The brand is marking 10 years of helping provide care and compassion during this year’s drive by:

Donating more than 250,000 pairs of socks directly to organizations fighting homelessness in all 50 states, along with Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. Since the program’s inception in 2009, Hanes has provided more than 3 million pairs of socks – one of the most requested items by relief agencies – to help the homeless.

Giving an additional pair of socks for every order of any apparel placed in December on Hanes.com. Socks will be provided to local homeless shelters.

Partnering with Rainier Fruit Company for its second “Pears for Pairs” campaign, which is currently running in United Supermarkets, Harris Teeter, Wegmans, and Lunds & Byerlys stores. From late September through January, Rainier is donating a portion of the proceeds from bulk and bagged pear sales to the Hanes National Sock Drive. In 2018, the Pears for Pairs campaign resulted in 20,000 pairs of socks being donated to five nonprofits.

Offering consumers the opportunity to participate directly in the program by visiting www.hanes.com/donate to gift socks ($1), women’s underwear ($1), men’s underwear ($1.50) and bras ($6) that will be distributed in needed styles and sizes.

Continuing its 10-year collaboration with Invisible People and its founder, Mark Horvath, to help raise awareness about homelessness. Invisible People uses innovative storytelling, educational resources and advocacy to help change how the public views homelessness and those living homeless in the United States and abroad.

“Most of us take basic apparel for granted, but we know a new, clean pair of socks can mean a lot to those experiencing homelessness,” said Sidney Falken, chief branding officer, HanesBrands. “We are committed to bringing a little comfort to those who need it most – and it is incredibly gratifying to have others, including many individuals across the country, join us in this effort.”

More than 100 agencies, including The Salvation Army Bell Shelter (Bell, California), Homeward Bound (Asheville, North Carolina) and Compassion Outreach Ministries (Columbus, Ohio), have received sock donations from Hanes.

“Small things really do make a big difference to our clients,” said Steve Lytle, director of The Salvation Army Bell Shelter. “The smile on a client’s face when she received a clean pair of socks for the first time in months was priceless. There was joy in her eyes and it was clear that the socks were the most precious gift she could have received in that moment. Another client said his gift of clean socks was a sign that there are people who care and that his life did matter.”

Homeward Bound distributes more than 2,000 pairs of socks a month to those living homeless.

“Homelessness is a community problem and it will take everyone’s support to help end the epidemic,” said Ashley Campbell, the agency’s outreach specialist. “Right now, some of your neighbors are living outside, in tents and under bridges, vulnerable to inclement weather and violence, stripped of dignity and our collective respect.

“There are so many ways to help,” Campbell continued. “Educate yourself about homelessness in your community, volunteer at your local agency fighting this issue or simply make a donation that would help a nonprofit save its limited resources.”

Jeffrey Tabor, director of TWO Men’s Ministry House for Compassion Outreach Ministries of Ohio, added that there is no donation too small to be used for good to fulfill a basic human need.

“Imagine the importance of just one pair of socks when you are focused on keeping your feet dry and warm during the cold winter months,” Tabor said. “That’s why we are so thankful for our partnership with Hanes, which has fulfilled an immediate, basic human need for so many people.”

Lytle underscores, however, that sometimes it all boils down to human contact. “Acknowledge people who are experiencing homelessness with a smile or hello,” he said. “By engaging with a person who is experiencing homelessness we are saying ‘I see you and you matter.’”

The Hanes National Sock Drive is part of Hanes for Good, the corporate responsibility program of Hanes’ parent company, HanesBrands (NYSE:HBI).

Organizations distributing Hanes socks include:

State

City

Organization

Alabama

Mobile

Family Promise of Coastal Alabama

Alaska

Anchorage

Brother Francis Shelter

Arizona

Phoenix

Phoenix Rescue Mission

Arkansas

Fayetteville

7Hills Center

California

Bell

The Salvation Army Bell Shelter

Hollywood

Covenant House California

Los Angeles

East Los Angeles Women's Center - Hope & H.E.A.R.T Emergency Shelter

Ktown for All

Los Angeles Mission

Street Symphony

San Diego

Father Joe's Village

Santa Clara

Bill Wilson Center

Watsonville

The Salvation Army

Whittier

Whittier Area Interfaith Council

Colorado

Denver

Colorado Coalition for the Homeless

Connecticut

Ansonia

Master's Table Community Meals

Waterbury

St. Vincent DePaul

Delaware

Dover

The Salvation Army

District of Columbia

Washington, D.C.

Covenant House Washington

Miriam's Kitchen

Florida

DeLand

God's Bathhouse

Fort Lauderdale

Covenant House Florida

Jacksonville Beach

Mission House

Lakeland

Talbot House Ministries

Pensacola

Alfred-Washburn Center

Waterfront Rescue Mission

Tampa

The Salvation Army

Georgia

Atlanta

Covenant House Georgia

Crossroads Community Ministries

Nicholas House

Zaban Paradies Center

Savannah

Divine Rest Inc.

Hawaii

Hilo

Hope Services Hawaii Inc.

Idaho

Boise

Interfaith Sanctuary Shelter

Illinois

Chicago

Covenant House Illinois

Lawndale Christian Health Center

The Night Ministry

The Salvation Army

Indiana

Indianapolis

Horizon House

Wheeler Mission

Iowa

Council Bluffs

MICHA House

Iowa City

Shelter House

Kansas

Topeka

Topeka Rescue Mission

Kentucky

Louisville

The Salvation Army

Louisiana

New Orleans

UNITY of Greater New Orleans

Maine

Bangor

Bangor Area Homeless Shelter

Maryland

Baltimore

Agape House Inc.

Baltimore Station

Massachusetts

Boston

Pine Street Inn

Michigan

Detroit

Covenant House Michigan

Mount Clemens

Turning Point

Minnesota

Minneapolis

St. Stephen's Street Outreach

Mississippi

Vicksburg

Warren County Children's Shelter

Missouri

St. Louis

Students-in-Transition (St. Louis School Board)

Montana

Billings

Montana Rescue Mission

Nebraska

Omaha

Siena/Francis House

Nevada

Las Vegas

Caridad Charity

New Hampshire

Concord

Concord Coalition to End Homelessness

Plymouth

Bridge House Inc.

New Jersey

Freehold

Destiny's Bridge

Lawrenceville

HomeFront

Newark

Covenant House New Jersey

New Mexico

Albuquerque

Joy Junction

New York

New York

Covenant House New York

Midnight Run

Syracuse

Rescue Mission Alliance

North Carolina

Asheville

Homeward Bound

Charlotte

Men's Shelter of Charlotte/Urban Ministry Center

Thomasville

Cooperative Community Ministry

Winston-Salem

Bethesda Center

Samaritan Ministries

The Salvation Army

Winston-Salem Rescue Mission

North Dakota

Bismarck

Ministry on the Margins

Minot

YWCA Minot

Ohio

Akron

Community Support Services

Cincinnati

Shelterhouse

Cleveland

The City Mission Men's Crisis Center

Columbus

Compassion Outreach Ministries

Oklahoma

Oklahoma City

City Rescue Mission

Oregon

Lebanon

Family Assistance and Resource Center

Portland

Central City Concern

Pennsylvania

Natrona

The Building Block of Natrona

Philadelphia

Bethesda Project

Covenant House Pennsylvania

Project HOME

Pittsburgh

Pittsburgh Mercy's Operation Safety Net

Pottsville

Schuylkill Women in Crisis

Wilkes-Barre

The Salvation Army

Puerto Rico

San Juan

The Salvation Army

Rhode Island

Providence

Crossroads Rhode Island

South Carolina

Columbia

Transitions Homeless Center

Sioux Falls

Bishop Dudley Hospitality House

Tennessee

Kingsport

Hunger First

Memphis

Urban Bike Food Ministry

Nashville

Open Table

Texas

Austin

Mobile Loaves and Fishes

Copperas Cove

Operation Stand Down Central Texas

Dallas

The Stewpot Dallas

Farmers Branch

Just Because Inc.

Houston

Covenant House Texas

Lord of the Streets

Utah

Salt Lake City

The Road Home

Vermont

Burlington

Committee On Temporary Shelter

Virginia

Charlottesville

The Haven

Richmond

The Salvation Army

Washington

Seattle

Seattle Homeless Outreach

The Salvation Army

West Virginia

Charleston

Union Mission

Parkersburg

The Salvation Army

Wisconsin

Milwaukee

The Guest House of Milwaukee

Waukesha

Hope Center

Wyoming

Casper

Wyoming Rescue Mission

  Hanes Hanes, America's No. 1 apparel brand, is a leading brand of intimate apparel, underwear, sleepwear, socks and casual apparel. Hanes products can be found at leading retailers nationwide and online direct to consumers at www.Hanes.com.  

HanesBrands

HanesBrands is a socially responsible leading marketer of everyday basic innerwear and activewear apparel in the Americas, Europe, Australia and Asia-Pacific. The company markets T-shirts, bras, panties, shapewear, underwear, socks, hosiery, and activewear under some of the world’s strongest apparel brands, including Hanes, Champion, Bonds, Maidenform, DIM, Bali, Playtex, Bras N Things, Nur Die/Nur Der, Alternative, L’eggs, JMS/Just My Size, Lovable, Wonderbra, Berlei, and Gear for Sports. More information about the company and its award-winning corporate social responsibility initiatives may be found at www.Hanes.com/corporate. Visit our newsroom at https://newsroom.hanesbrands.com/. Connect with the company via social media: Twitter (@hanesbrands), Facebook (www.facebook.com/hanesbrandsinc), Instagram (@hanesbrands), and LinkedIn (@Hanesbrandsinc).

# # #

Contact:                  

Carole Crosslin, HanesBrands                                                                                                   

336-671-3704 (mobile)                                                                      

carole.crosslin@hanes.com 

  Jamie Wallis, Hanes

336-519-4758

jamie.wallis@hanes.com

source: https://www.csrwire.com/press_releases/43169-A-Decade-of-Care-Hanes-Launches-10th-National-Sock-Drive-to-Help-the-Homeless-Tops-3-Million-Donated-Pairs?tracking_source=rss

[marilynngmesalo]

Risk of flooding, mudslides remains after powerful California storm

Risk of flooding, mudslides remains after powerful California storm Risk of flooding, mudslides remains after powerful California storm https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

SAUSALITO, Calif. — Authorities warn that mudslides are still possible Friday even after a damaging storm moved through California, trapping people in floodwaters, triggering a debris flow that destroyed homes, and forcing residents to flee communities scorched by wildfires last year.

The powerful system swept in from the Pacific Ocean and unleashed rain, snow and wind across the U.S. West into Wyoming, Colorado and Arizona after walloping Northern California and southern Oregon earlier.

The rain mostly ended Thursday night. But officials said hillsides could still loosen and collapse, bringing down mud, boulders and debris.

“The ground is still so saturated and the water is still flowing down from the mountains,” said April Newman, spokeswoman for Riverside County Fire Department.

The National Weather Service reported staggering rainfall amounts across California, including more than 9.4 inches (24 centimetres) over 48 hours at one location in the San Bernardino Mountains east of Los Angeles.

All evacuation orders reduced to warnings for the Holy Burn areas. #HolyFloodWatch @RivCoReady @CtyLakeElsinore pic.twitter.com/4sCmPo93V7

— CAL FIRE Riverside (@CALFIRERRU) February 15, 2019

A woman pulled from rising water in a low-lying area between those mountains and Los Angeles had a heart attack and died at a hospital, said Capt. Ryan Rolston with the Corona Fire Department. The unidentified woman was one of nine people and three dogs rescued in a flood-control channel where homeless people camp, Rolston said.

A second death was reported in Escondido, northeast of San Diego, where firefighters recovered the body of a man who had been seen paddle boarding in the surging waters of a concrete-lined flood-control channel.

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North of San Francisco, a mudslide barrelled over cars, uprooted trees and sent a home sliding down a hill and smashing into another house in Sausalito.

A woman was rescued from the splintered wreckage with only cuts and bruises. Susan Gordon was buried under a tree and mud for two hours while crews dug her out, her son wrote on an online fundraising page.

Chris Parkman said it has been years since a storm so powerful has hit the hillside community, where at least 50 properties were evacuated.

“We don’t see the rain most of the year. So most of the year you feel safe. But when the big storms come, your safety factor is gone,” he said.

Further north, a levee along State Route 37 near Novato was breached, flooding a rural field. Officials were monitoring the area in case water flows onto the highway or train tracks.

More photos from our #FelsparIncident a water rescue in Jurupa Valley. More info at: https://t.co/qfPy3OcOkj pic.twitter.com/qqSZDoufM6

— CAL FIRE Riverside (@CALFIRERRU) February 14, 2019

A deluge southeast of Los Angeles washed away a section of a two-lane mountain highway. Photos by the state Department of Transportation showed about 75 feet (23 metres) of pavement completely collapsed along State Route 243 near the remote community of Idyllwild.

“We’re basically stranded right now,” said resident Gary Agner, adding that several other roads were closed because of flooding and debris. “I’m glad I went to the grocery store yesterday.”

The risk of flooding led officials to order people out of areas burned bare by a summer wildfire in the Santa Ana Mountains, with flash-flood warnings blanketing a huge swath east and south of Los Angeles. The evacuation orders were downgraded to flood warnings Thursday night.

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Authorities also told parts of artsy Laguna Beach to evacuate for much of the day, while the desert resort city of Palm Springs urged residents to stay in place because of flooded streets. In Cabazon, two people marooned on the roof of their flooded car were rescued by helicopter.

Flood advisories extended to Arizona.

Weather was so severe that the Hollywood Walk of Fame had to postpone the dedication of a sidewalk star honouring the band Aerosmith. Knott’s Berry Farm and Six Flags Magic Mountain theme parks closed.

Trouble also persisted in saturated Northern California, where thousands of people lost power and flooding was possible. Downtown San Francisco saw more than 1.75 inches (4.4 centimetres) of rain over 24 hours.

A flooded creek led authorities to urge about 300 residents to leave a community about 20 miles (32 kilometres) west of Paradise, a town destroyed last year by the nation’s deadliest wildfire in a century.

The storm followed more than a week of severe weather in the Pacific Northwest and was the latest in a series of storms that has all but eliminated drought-level dryness in California this winter. It’s fueled by an atmospheric river — a plume of moisture stretching across the Pacific Ocean nearly to Hawaii.

Nearly 37 per cent of California had no level of drought or abnormal dryness, the U.S. Drought Monitor reported Thursday. About 10.5 per cent of the state was in moderate drought, and just over 1.6 per cent was in severe drought. The remainder was in the abnormally dry category. The numbers reflect data gathered up to Tuesday.

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Atmospheric rivers are long bands of water vapour that form over an ocean and flow through the sky. Formed by winds associated with storms, they occur globally but are especially significant on the West Coast.

Even before the height of the storm, mandatory evacuations were ordered near the wildfire area in the Santa Ana Mountains where officials said there was a high risk of debris flows.

Tim Suber chose not to leave his hillside neighbourhood in Lake Elsinore. He said Thursday that he has lost count of how many times his family has been evacuated between last summer’s devastating wildfire and this winter’s storms.

The rain was so heavy that “it sounds like a hundred bowling balls a minute are going down the creek” behind his house, Suber said. A neighbour had mud in his pool, but so far the area hadn’t lost power and culverts and washes were handling the runoff.

WATER RESCUE – 56th Street X Felspar Street in Jurupa Valley. More: https://t.co/FmMjYuJW80 #FelsparIncident pic.twitter.com/mBI7HRkJm3

— CAL FIRE Riverside (@CALFIRERRU) February 14, 2019

The storm delayed flights destined for San Francisco International Airport, closed sections of several key highways, including Highway 1 on the Central Coast, Interstate 5 north of Sacramento, and U.S. 395 in the snowy eastern Sierra Nevada.

Wintry weather closed Interstate 80 in California near the Nevada border and across much of Wyoming and sections of at least four other highways. Multiple avalanches disrupted highway traffic in northwestern Montana near the Idaho border.

In Colorado, high winds shattered windows and downed power poles, leaving thousands in Colorado Springs without power.

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[thedeadshotnetwork]

California Wildfires Are Harming the State's Most Vulnerable Populations As Southern California's firestorm continues to grow and air quality plummets, what happens to one of the largest unsheltered homeless populations in the nation? This story was produced in collaboration with Climate Central . David Ewing wears a bright white dust mask, his face behind it puffy and red, as he sits on a stone bench in downtown Santa Barbara, California. A fine layer of ash covers the pavement at his feet, dirty residue from wildfires ravaging the region. "When I woke up yesterday I couldn't breathe," says Ewing, who is homeless and has been diagnosed with cancer. He spent the previous night sleeping behind a Saks department store. "This stuff is just wiping me out." Ewing is among the tens of thousands of homeless in Southern California who are struggling to escape the smoke as wildfires tear through the region. Experts caution against spending time outdoors when it's smoky, but for many, staying inside isn't an option. Wildfire seasons have been growing longer and more severe throughout the American West. Heat-trapping pollution and the effects of weather cycles have pushed up temperatures. Meanwhile, saplings and other fuel for fires has accumulated in forests. That's stoking blazes that are undermining long-running efforts to clean the air using environmental regulations. "When we have warm conditions, that tends to draw more moisture out of vegetation," says John Abatzoglou , a geographer at the University of Idaho who studies climate change and wildfires. "It tends to accelerate the rate at which vegetation dries up and becomes receptive to igniting and carrying fire." Wildfire smoke can travel hundreds of miles and blanket valleys and regions, creating what scientists call smoke waves. Smoke waves are pulses of bad air caused by fires that linger stubbornly for days, similar to heat waves. Smoke contains chemicals from burning rubber and homes. It can also worsen ozone pollution. And it's filled with tiny particles known as PM2.5, which can lodge inside lungs, trigger coughing, worsen diseases like asthma, and lead to long-term damage including cancer. Climate change-focused research published in the journal Environmental Research Letters a year ago concluded smoke could send 30 more people to hospitals across the West each year during the late 2040s than was the case 40 years earlier as smoke waves become more frequent and severe, mostly in the late summer and early fall. Some counties were projected to see little or no change. Impacts could be heavy in parts of central Colorado and Washington—and in Southern California. "The larger the fire, the more people are affected, and the worse the health impacts will be," says Loretta Mickley , a Harvard University researcher who worked on the study. "It's just one more consequence of our love of emitting these greenhouse gases. So it's one more reason to think about, 'OK, let's cut these emissions back.'" Even a state with some of America's most rigorous and progressive pollution standards can do little protect itself. "Our state laws and policies and local efforts are all working to drive down smog and soot pollution," says William Barrett, a policy analyst in California at the non-profit American Lung Association , which has been providing masks to the Red Cross to give to the needy. "But now with our changing environment, we're seeing longer and more severe fire seasons and, along with that, greater impacts to air quality." As with most pollution, the poorest and frailest are the most vulnerable to smoke waves. An Environmental Protection Agency study of emergency room visits linked to a North Carolina wildfire that burned in 2008 showed health risks from PM2.5 increased in the counties with the poorest residents and with the greatest levels of income inequality. In California, where a fast-growing population is fueling a housing crisis, officials and non-profits have been working to protect the homeless population, such as by providing masks. Non-profit workers have also been providing masks to farm workers. Homeless people and farm workers can be especially vulnerable because they often have limited access to health care and have trouble sheltering inside when the smoke outside is heavy. Wildfires tore through Southern California this week fueled by hot and dry seasonal winds—called Santa Ana winds—blowing over landscapes left parched by an unusual absence of fall storms. The largest blaze, the Thomas Fire , which raced across the hills of Ventura, was stopped only by the Pacific Ocean after the flames hopped the 101 freeway. At least three others scorched the hills above Los Angeles. "This is probably one of the worst times I've had to deal with it," says Kevin Ellis, 49, a marijuana farm worker who was walking his gray pit bull next to eerily empty volleyball courts on Santa Barbara's East Beach on Friday. "It bothers me, I've been working in it—I worked 13 hours yesterday—but I've got a mask." While California's wildfire trends have in the past been linked to global warming , the fires ravaging Southern California this week have been driven largely by the whims of the weather . "Global warming is there and it's having an influence," says Park Williams , a climate and ecology researcher at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. "But there's a bunch of other stuff going on too." The conditions stoking the blazes in Southern California are projected to become more common and severe in the years ahead as greenhouse gas pollution from fossil fuel burning, deforestation, farming, and other industrial practices accumulates in the atmosphere, changing temperatures and rainfall patterns. As a thick yellow haze filled the air this week, air quality alerts went out warning residents outside of evacuation zones to seek shelter. Winds late in the week were pushing the smoke far up the California coast, over the Silicon Valley and into San Francisco, affecting millions. "It's been very difficult for outpatients to breathe," says Laren Tan , a pulmonologist at Loma Linda University in San Bernardino County. He tells patients to stay inside as much as possible when smoke waves hit, and to close their windows and use air filters. The Southern California wildfires could be seen by the International Space Station crew from their vantage point in low Earth orbit. But even getting indoors can be a major challenge for the homeless in L.A., one of the only U.S. cities where homelessness is rising. In 2017, the number of homeless people climbed to over 55,000—up more than 13,000 from the year prior. L.A. also has the largest unsheltered subpopulation of any big city, according to Colleen Murphy , an outreach coordinator for the L.A. Homeless Services Authority. "In most big cities, there's at least shelters to go to at night. In Los Angeles, 75 percent of our homeless are unsheltered, so that means on any given night, they're sleeping outdoors or in their cars," she says. For comparison, 5 percent of New York City's 76,000 homeless are unsheltered. "It's very challenging even on a good day." Since the fires began, outreach teams, which sometimes include medical and mental-health professionals, have fanned out across the city to try to get people off the streets and into the city's shelters or a Red Cross facility. "We've mobilized our street teams, because we do get that extra bump of beds available during the winter months," Murphy says. "We're trying to let people know, 'Hey, the winter shelters are open, so please let us take you there.'" In Ventura County, where as of Friday the Thomas Fire had burned 132,000 acres and more than 400 buildings, workers at the transitional living facility operated by county officials were handing out masks. Some of the homeless are turning up at evacuation shelters as well. The fires have struck Southern California at an unusual time and with rare ferocity, bookending a deadly wildfire season that destroyed neighborhoods and killed dozens in wine country north of San Francisco and filled the sweeping Central Valley farming region with smoke from forest fires in mountains nearby. The blazes are part of a years-long fiery crisis for the West—one that's only expected to get worse. "How much longer are we going to go through this?" Ewing says, sitting on the stone bench, his backpack and a large black garbage bag at his feet. "I'm homeless and I have to breathe it all day long." This piece was produced in partnership with Climate Central , a non-profit that researches and reports on the changing climate. December 9, 2017 at 02:45PM

[homelesshaunts-blog]

Homeless Haunts

Family Man by Jeff Gelb

No more big house, but a man has a need for a much smaller house, one enough room for a family man...

Homeless Haunts welcomes you. I'm Lavel Wideman, your Bloghost of Horror.

After his wife dies he's set alone. A man bury's his wife and tries not to think of her, and not so heavily. His mind imprinted of years they spent together in the house. An invitation from his son makes him realize, a move is what his father needs. Maybe a good omen to turn over a new leaf. His search for the perfect house didn't take him long but it's not the house the problem, it's the occupants who live in the house he's found, that are. Previous owners, who may not be able to move away so easily...

The Family Man by Jeff Gelb

After the funeral, I returned to the home Sarah and I had shared for the last twenty-six years. As soon as I entered the comfortable colonial house, I knew I'd have to move. Sarah's presence was everywhere. She'd decorated the whole thing, and spent hours each week keeping it spotless. Whenever I smelled Comet, or Lysol, or furniture polish, I was immediately reminded of her.

And right then, that was something I didn't want. I mean, don't get me wrong--I loved my wife, always have. She and I went back a long way--to high school, in fact, where she was the homecoming queen and I was the class president. It was pretty stereotypical, but somehow it worked. It worked even though we married two months before I was drafted into the Big War. It worked even though we had to live with my folks for the first three years of out marriage, in the attic of a cramped little dump on the wrong side of town...It worked even though our kid Jerry, was a mistake who almost miscarried during a particularly rough pregnancy that kept Sarah off her feet most of the time. After that, we'd decided not to chance a second pregnancy, and I got real good with rubbers till Sarah went through menopause.

Yeah, we were pretty damn good together. Jerry, now thirty-four and living out on the West Coast with a wife and kid of his own, would tease us about still being on our honeymoon after forty years. He wasn't quite right, but he wasn't far from it. It really was a pretty solid relationship...

But now she was gone, and our beautiful house seemed like it was closing in on me. Funny--in fifty-nine years, I never realized I was claustrophobic...Back at the funeral, Jerry had invited me back to Los Angeles to spend some time with his family, and truth to tell, it was a pretty appealing invitation. Sarah and I had visited Jer once a year every year since his radio career had taken him from Rochester to Southern California some dozen years ago. We'd come to love the area...Jesus, the housing is expensive out here! I had this fantasy the money I'd made off my house in Rochester would pay for home out here and maybe even leave me a little neat egg. Boy, was I wrong.

It was a scorcher of a winter's day in January...I got caught in one of those quintessential Southern California freeway traffic jams...

I knew I'd get lost negotiating surface streets but anything was better than that freeway. So I attempted to fake my way up to Westwood...Kinda nice, too, with older homes that had been well kept.

...Finally I looked at my watch and figured I'd better get on to Westwood if I wanted to talk to anyone about getting work. And that's when I saw it.

The house sat by itself, on a big corner lot, sharing the space with a lamppost and a "Dead End" sign. Behind it was one of those bizarre oil rigs you see all the time in California. State-owned property I guessed. The house itself was colonial, kind of like the home I'd recently sold. That's what caught my eye. That; and the handpainted "For Sale" sign that stood in the tall grass of the front lawn. That lawn needed tending, I thought with a smile. My fingers itched for a lawn mower and a pair of shears.

On impulse, I parked in the driveway and strode up to the front door. As I awaited an answer to my knocking...

A young girl, maybe fourteen, answered the door. Pretty as a picture, too, with delicate features and long blond hair. She looked like she could afford to spend a little more time in the sun. Maybe she'd been ill.

"Uh...hi," I started sheepishly. "Saw the sign out front," I pointed.

"You want to talk to Irv," she enthused, opening the screen door and pulling me inside the house...

"The girl turned, smiling, and yelled up the carpeted staircase. "Irv! Company!"

"Hi there!"

I must have jumped visibly, because I heard the little boy laugh. I turned toward the voice.

"Irv?"

"That's me!" He held out his hand and I took it, almost recoiling. His hand was as cold and slimy as a dead fish...He wiped perspiration from his forehead. "Here about the house?"

"Well, yes, I am. Though, to be honest, I doubt I could afford it."

"Oh, you'd be surprised. Actually, it's been on the market awhile and no one's bet...

"Well..." I was uncomfortable talking money in front of the man's family, but obviously he wasn't.

"Sixty-nine five."

"I beg your pardon?" I asked.

"Sixty-nine five," Irv repeated. "That's what I'm asking."

"...That's quite reasonable, Irv. What's wrong? Got termites?"

"I...I'm getting a divorce." He looked at his beautiful wife and children. "Guess you could say I'm just not a family man..."

"I'll have to think about it," I said...

Irv looked like he'd just eaten a raw onion. "I...have to be out of here by the end of the month. Going back home, to Idaho."

I had the realtor hire some guys to give the house the once-over, and when they came back with their okays, I revisited Irv with my checkbook...

Irv hovered over me like a pesky fly while I signed the check and the papers, and I thought he was going to kiss me as I left, he was so jubilant...

On my way out, Irv's realtor confided that his client "wasn't well," and he pointed to the side of his head, making circles. No kidding, I thought.

...I looked back at the house--at my house, or what would be my house in a week, after Irv and his family had moved out...

I turned the key and let myself in...I took my time walking up the stairs, admiring the finish on the wooden banister. I had to admit, whoever'd rebuilt this place had done a fine job.

I heard a noise from one of the bedrooms. I was about to run like hell to a neighbor's house and call the police when the little boy, Robert, stepped out of his bedroom, holding a comic book. He was beaming.

"Hi!" he greeted me innocently.

I laughed nervously. "Well, I hate to be blunt, but how come you and the children are still here?"

Barbara and her kids sat together, backs to one wall, while I sat on the floor against the opposite wall. No one spoke--it was all very uncomfortable.

She obviously didn't know what to say, and I felt terrible for her.

"Do you need more time," I started, "to get packed up? Because that's fine with me. I'll just come back tomorrow...or next week. Whatever," I shrugged.

"We don't really have anywhere else to go," she finally said.

"...Do you need someone to help you find a new place?"

She shook her pretty head. "We can't resettle," she said. I noticed the kids had stopped playing and were watching us intently. I was starting to lose my cool. "Well, I'm sympathetic, but you have to understand, you can't live here..."

"Well, we don't really live here," Barbara said, the hint of a smile on her face.

Was this whole family batty?..."I think I will take you up on that offer for a beer," I said.

Robert bounded to his feet and ran through the kitchen door. I mean to say, he ran through the damned thing, like one of those haunted house movies...

Barbara smiled and said, "Irv tried, he really did...But he'd never been married before and I'm afraid we were, in the end, a bit much for him."

"Like he said," I recalled aloud, "he isn't a family man."

By now the kids had floated to my side, the three of them forming a semicircle around me. Robert bobbed up and down in the air excitedly.

ALLEY OF FEAR

It's a frightening discovery when the house you just bought doesn't belong to you, not outrightly. Perhaps what you invested in, that nest egg, is a true bonfide haunted house with a family of ghost to come with it.

The house is not necessarily a normal purchase, but the saying goes "we live together, we die together" is a statement that goes a long way.

A house that contains a woman and her children, one boy and one girl, were murdered in this quaint little colonial home; is a house like the old one he's had but smaller and more efficient. Is just right for him to live in without feeling the walls closing in on him. But only one thing stops him from having that homey feel. Is not yet reached when he finds out the house comes with a deal: "You take the house, we come with it" deal."

A family of ghost cannot pick up and go and not so fast. The last guy couldn't take it anymore and wasn't the typical "family man." And hadn't the experience to be a family man. Instead it takes a man who has enough guts, what we call machismo in handling this situation. A man who can complete a circle i.e. " family man."

A house that waits for the right guy to come along and take this position in a world where a house like this sits. And when you can hear floors creak, the doors squeak, the closing of a refrigerator door fetching beer. Making certain in this home, you're not alone.

There are many who don't know where to go or where to call "Home." But in this story I beg the differ...

The Alley of Fear for the time being may be the best place for right now. May not be the deal of a lifetime but the Alley of Fear may beat waiting for someone to complete a family. Especially, if he's not gung-ho about filling a position which isn't his fault and that's the difference.

But however long it takes, we have a family waiting for someone to fill a position in an empty house: a house that sits by the sideway with cobwebs and rickety floors. While they wait it will be in the Alley of Fear and for the time being; they'll wait here for that knock at that door until their story is told.

Good evening ladies and gentlemen. In your own homes and if you have one?

Homeless Haunts bringing the world of the poor to your door.

All rights preserved at Boot Productions 2017

[newstfionline]

Rights Battles Emerge in Cities Where Homelessness Can Be a Crime

By Jack Healy, NY Times, Jan. 9, 2017

DENVER--Condos and townhouses are rising beside the weedy lots here where Randy Russell once pitched a tent and unrolled a sleeping bag, clustering with other homeless people in camps that were a small haven to him, but an illegal danger in the eyes of city officials.

Living on the streets throws a million problems your way, but finding a place to sleep tops the list. About 32 percent of homeless people have no shelter, according to the federal government, and on Nov. 28, Mr. Russell, 56, was among them. He was sitting in an encampment just north of downtown when the police and city workers arrived to clear it away. A police officer handed Mr. Russell a citation.

“Now I don’t have a place to sleep tonight,” Mr. Russell told the officer in a video. “You’re taking my home away from me.”

Growing numbers of homeless encampments have led to civic soul-searching in cities around the country, from Philadelphia to Chicago to Seattle. Should cities open up public spaces to their poorest residents, or sweep away camps that city leaders, neighbors and business groups see as islands of drugs and crime?

For those on the streets--who have lost their jobs, have suffered from drug addiction, mental illness or disabilities--crackdowns on homeless camps are seen as tantamount to punishing people for being poor.

Activists and homeless residents like Mr. Russell are waging public campaigns and court fights against local laws that ban “urban camping”--prohibitions that activists say are aimed at the homeless. The right to rest, they say, should be a new civil right for the homeless. Many wear buttons that ask, “Move Along to Where?” and are challenging misdemeanor citations and anti-camping ordinances, like Denver’s, in court.

“They take away your means of survival,” said Jerry Burton, who was ticketed the same day as Mr. Russell.

In recent years, the Obama administration has offered the homeless and their advocates some support. In a 2015 letter addressing a law in Boise, Idaho, the Justice Department warned that local laws criminalizing homelessness could violate the Constitution’s protections against cruel and unusual punishment. And the Department of Housing and Urban Development has said it takes into consideration policies that criminalize homelessness when deciding which places should get competitive grants.

Advocates for the homeless said those policies had strengthened their hand. They are now worried about how those measures--and broader funding for homeless services--might fare under President-elect Donald J. Trump, who ran as a “law and order candidate.”

“We’re quite concerned,” said Maria Foscarinis, the founder and executive director of the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, which estimated that half of American cities had some kind of anti-camping law.

“No sooner do you win the battle than 10 other cities pop up criminalizing homelessness,” Ms. Foscarinis added. “The idea was if you could get the federal government on your side, you have a much broader impact.”

Nationwide, the number of homeless people is declining, according to the most recent counts. But camps have become a particularly acute problem in the West, where soaring housing costs and a scarcity of subsidized apartments have pushed homelessness to the fore in booming towns like Seattle, Los Angeles, Denver and San Francisco.

As new clusters of tents and sleeping bags pop up along river banks, on city sidewalks and in parks and gentrifying neighborhoods, they are exposing deep divisions about how cities should strike a balance between accommodation and enforcement.

In Seattle, where violence has flared in a homeless camp known as the Jungle, beneath a freeway, there was a fierce response to a councilman’s proposal to allow the city’s 3,000 unsheltered homeless residents to camp in some parks and on undeveloped public land.

Scores of residents packed a City Hall hearing in October, according to The Seattle Times. Some shouted, “Recall!” Others applauded a Republican politician who urged “zero tolerance.”

“I’m not going to solve homelessness by outlawing it,” said Mike O’Brien, the Seattle councilman who proposed accommodating some homeless camps. (The legislation did not get far.) “These folks, they don’t have a lot of good options. The best choice they face every day is sleeping under that bridge.”

Officials and advocates cite many reasons for the growing number of encampments and the clashes over them. Gentrification in old neighborhoods. Citywide housing shortages. Rough conditions in shelters.

A one-night survey last January found a 67 percent rise in the number of unsheltered homeless people in Seattle since 2011.

“The threat of homelessness is becoming more real,” Mr. O’Brien said. “More of us know people. They’ve gone to couch-surfing. They’re living in their vehicles. I know people who are losing their housing, and it’s scary.”

In November, San Francisco voted to ban sidewalk tents and allow the city to remove them with 24 hours’ notice. In July, Philadelphia lifted a four-year-old ban on serving meals in public parks after homeless advocates and faith groups sued the city. Portland, Ore., was so roiled by the blowback to a “safe sleep policy” announced in February that the mayor rescinded it six months later.

In Denver, videos of the police seizing blankets and tents on the cusp of winter created a public outcry and demands to soften the city’s approach.

Denver officials appeared taken aback by the furor. They pointed out that the city was creating permanent housing for 250 homeless residents, had set up a $150 million housing fund for low- and moderate-income families and was starting a pilot program to employ people living on the streets.

Denver officials say there is no shortage of shelter space--it is available any night to anyone who needs it. Outreach workers visit camps before they are dismantled to try to steer people to shelters or other services, the officials said.

Officials estimate Denver’s homeless population at 3,500 to 3,600, about 500 of whom are not in transitional housing or shelters on any given night.

Denver officials said that Mr. Russell and two other people who were cited in late November had refused multiple offers of assistance and orders to move from police officers, and had been illegally camping as a “means of protest.” Police officials said they and outreach workers had thousands of interactions with people living on the street, and few ended with criminal citations.

In a statement, Mayor Michael B. Hancock said the city would not seize any more camping equipment until the end of April when it enforces the camping ban. According to the Denver police, 26 people have been cited under the ban since it was passed in 2012, and officers issue citations only as a last resort.

City officials say the camps are neither safe nor healthy for neighbors or camp occupants. They have found piles of trash by the Platte River and human waste on sidewalk encampments by Coors Field, where the Colorado Rockies play. When the City Council passed the camping ban by a 9-to-4 vote, supporters said clearing the camps was a health and safety necessity, and they have rejected recent calls from activists to repeal or scale back the regulation.

What keeps Trena Vahle up at night is the cold, the gunshots, the people walking past the tent she has pitched at the end of a line of tents, overstuffed shopping carts and plastic-tarp yurts in an alley just down the block from an architecture studio, brewery and cocktail lounge in Denver’s trendy River North neighborhood.

“We’ve been told five times to leave,” she said.

Ms. Vahle, 47, said she had been out of work since she tore a back muscle at the Iowa factory where she made plastic coolers. She said she had moved to Colorado in 2015 after being arrested on a trespassing charge related to homelessness. She did not like the shelters--she had to shower on a lottery system, and three of her bags had been stolen. The alley is her spot, she said. For now.