MOAB, Utah — An entire Moab neighborhood is facing the possibility of homelessness as the city is giving residents of a mobile home park just two months to move out.
“I love Moab," said resident Melva Cruz. "I've been here so long. My kids grew up here. They don't wanna go, I don't wanna go, we wanna stay here.”
Cruz and her family has been living on Walnut Lane for 15 years.
“It's not the nicest place, but it's cheap," she said. "We have everything that we need. We wanna stay here. We don't wanna leave.”
A few days ago, Cruz received a notice telling her she has to leave her trailer, which she owns, by the end of June.
“I started crying," Cruz said. "I was like, 'where am I gonna go?' It's hard.
"It's hard because I don't have a place to take my grandkid to be honest, I don't have a place to take them. We live together because that's how we can help each other. Moab it's like, it's so expensive. I don't have $8000 to go rent a place. I don't.”
The city bought the mobile home park in 2018 with the intent of turning it into an affordable housing development. Six years later and there’s no development and no plan in sight.
“We were notified in March that the insurer was no longer going to cover [Walnut Lane]. It was going to be excluded from our policy, and so we are just scrambling now to figure out what to do,” explained interim city manager David Everitt.
The city held meetings for Walnut Lane residents Friday to tell them about the assistance package they’ll be received and to connect them with resources. But residents say they just don’t feel like they have enough time.
“When we saw the notice, they give us just two months to be out. It's kind of shocking because they know Moab. Everybody does. Housing is really hard," said resident Juan Carlos Medina Garcia. "Most in two months, you're not gonna find a place in two months.”
The city claims it will do everything it can to help the residents find housing, such as giving all of them $10,000 if they move out by June 30.
“Moab, like much of the state, is experiencing a housing shortage," Everitt added. "Ours is even worse. It's exacerbated by the fact that there's not a lot of stock here at all. We're surrounded by public lands.”
Cruz says she can’t move her trailer, along with and with her family, dogs and cats. It will be impossible to find a place where she can afford to live in Moab.
“They should have not bought the place and lied to us," she said. "They promised us housing, better apartments, and they haven’t done anything.
"I can't become homeless with my grandkid, my kids. They all grew up in that trailer.”
A GoFundMe page has been set up to help the residents and families of Walnut Lane.
