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My family and I have been living in a shelter since October and our time is almost up. Our largest need is a vehicle, nothing special just something that runs ok and can help me keep my job and get our four kids to the doctors and to the store.We have been without transportation for a year.....please help

   Hi! This is all kind of new to me, so, I guess... here is our story. 

    In September of 1996, I met the man who is now my husband. (Rob)  At that time, he told me that he was the father of two children. Briana who lived in Arizona, and Marley who was due any day in the state of Washington. (We did and still live in Ohio.)  I accepted that.  

   By October of 1996, Rob was trying to set up child support for Marley. (He would have done the same for Briana, but we were unable to locate her since her crazy mother moved around so much.) By December of 1996, paternity was established, and child support began coming directly out of his weekly pay checks.  We received pictures of Marley, sent gifts, and wrote letters.  Things went well for about 3 years.

   In June of 1999, we were contacted by the state of Arizona. They wanted to know if we were interested in getting custody of Briana. (DUH!!!) We began a two year battle with Briana's mother, grandmother, and Arizona Dept. of Children's Services. (ADCS) By January of 2001, we had traveled across the country in my sister's Grand Am, gone to court over the telephone, and fought HARD. We got full physical custody on January 21, 2001. All the while, Rob paid child support weekly for Marley in Washington.

   So, here we are living in a two bedroom apartment with a 5 year old who had no place to play, and couldn't make friends in the area because she was one of very few kids. We considered buying a house, but, with the way things had been going financially, we opted for a mobile home instead. I was managing a gas station, and Rob was a roofer.  In August of 2005, we bought a 3 bedroom trailer on a large wooded lot in a great school district with LOTS of kids for Briana to play with. The trailer park has 24 hour security, and we were really happy with our choice. So much so that eventually, my parents moved near by, and later my brother and sister bought and share a trailer here also. All the while, Rob paid child support weekly to Marley directly from his pay check.

   Right around October of 2005, we received a letter in the mail from Washington Dept. of Children's services. (WDCS) Apparently, Marley's mom (who had not contacted us in about 2 years) was in prison for stealing money from her employer. Her mother had gotten custody of Marley. (Without Rob's knowledge. Believe me, we fought to get Briana, we would have fought just as hard to get Marley if we had known what was going on.) Anyway, the child support was now going to be paid to Marley's grandmother, Kim, instead of Marley's mother, Janet. All the while, Rob paid the support weekly directly out of his pay check.

   ***Admittedly, there was an issue of arrears in late 2003. Rob had changed jobs, and the employer "forgot" to send money to Washington. Through income tax refunds, and increased amounts taken from Rob's weekly check, the arrears were paid in full. (We can prove this.)*** 

   In November of 2005, I lost my job. The company I worked for sold the retail location I managed, and opted to sell fuel wholesale because the govornment gave them a tax break if they did. (They sold all but ten of their 114 stores.) By this time, Rob had become a robotic welder techician, and was making REALLY good money. We decided I should try to fulfill a life long dream of owning my own business with my mom, and sister. (By 2007, the business had failed miserably.) Okay, back to 2005... It was around Christmas that we received notice that the child support case for Marley had been closed. The letter we got said that either the child was no longer in need of support OR the primary care giver was not in need of assistance.  We called WDCS. We were told there was no information available due to "privacy issues" with Marley's mother, but that support would no longer be taken from Rob's check, and as soon as Ohio tied up their loose ends, the case would no longer be enforced. Rob continued to pay support weekly from his pay check.

   In March of 2006, we started to receive checks in the exact amount taken from Rob's weekly pay checks. We contacted his case worker in Ohio. She was not in the office, so he left a voicemail. (We contacted this woman AT LEAST twice a month, and left voicemail every time.) So, Rob called WDCS.  The VERY nice, and helpful case worker there said the case was closed on their end, and the checks were coming back because they had no one to give the money to. She even said that we had a limited amount of time to cash them, (90 days) and new checks would not be issued if they were just not cashed. So, we cashed them.

   The Ohio case worker did not contact us until...(are you ready for this???) September of 2007. She said she was trying to get our new address because Ohio Child Support Enforcement Agency (OCSEA) was not notified of the move in 2005. (NOT TRUE! we had correspondence mailed to our new address from OCSEA concerning the insurance he provides for Marley.)

   It was at that time that Rob asked about the case being closed. The case worker freaked out, and told him he had been illeagally cashing those checks, and she would notify him of his arrears, the case was not closed. She would make arrangements to intercept the checks from Washington.

   In October of 2007, we received a letter stating that Rob was $541 in arrears, and it would either be taken out of his 2007 state refund or his federal refund, or both. We contacted WDCS, they agreed to fax the closure letter to the case worker again to prove the case had been closed. Mind you, Rob was still paying support weekly from his pay check.

   In February of 2008, we had our taxes done. We have been going to the same tax preparer from H&R Block for the last ten years. (And my parents before us for fifteen years.) He told us our refund was going to be$4900. We were SO relieved. You see, we live in Lorain County in Ohio. I DARE you to find a job in this area. Stores, and manufacturing companies have been closing all over this county, and the area has become VERY depressed to say the least. We had moved my brother-in-law into our home to help make ends meet, but, he turned out to be a non-working crack head. Needless to say, the bills were piling up, and we fell behind in our lot rent for the trailer. We went to court a week after we had our taxes done for an eviction from the trailer park. We took our tax info from H&R Block, and the judge gave us until March 30, 2008 to pay the lot rent.

   When it came time for our check to be picked up from H&R Block, I called and they told me to call this phone number. It turned out to be the IRS. I was given another phone number to call. It was OCSEA. I spoke to a woman who called herself Betty. I explained the situation. I will never forget what followed. She said; "Oh no, that's not right. The arrears were far less than $4900.00! I reviewed this case myself with our tax girl. This is very wrong. I'll give you her extention. Her name is Chrissy... you can leave her a voicemail, she'll get back to you." Since then, we have contacted OCSEA once a week. We have not heard from them. WDCS has AGAIN sent notification of closure to OCSEA. Still nothing.

  In the mean time, we have 13 DAYS to come up with the lot rent, and court costs for the eviction, totalling $2500. We cannot get a loan. (we tried) Our families cannot help us. (we asked) We cannot afford a lawyer. (they want to be paid), and although I've spent the last month and a half praying, and fasting, there appears to be no help in sight. God has answered a few prayers. I got a good job, Rob is still working, and we're healthy. Briana doesn't know what's going on, and I fear that on March 30th. she won't have a home.

  The real tragedy is that Rob and I have no idea if Marley is safe, we don't know if she's still in Washington, and have not been able to contact her in years. Unfortunately, the immediate problem is more important at this point. We have no place to go, cannot afford to move, and only have 13 days to figure this out.     

   By the way, Rob is STILL paying support from his pay chech every week.

   We have contacted our congress woman, several lawyers, and a few father's rights support groups for assistance. No one has been able to help. 

In Desperate Need of Help!!!!

Me and My husband, along with our 3 kids(ages 6, 2, & 1) moved here to GA. last week from Va. We were part of a "Craigslist" Scam, we found a young lady who was wanting to rent a 3bdrm townhouse in Riverdale, Ga. Now the only reason we chose this young lady to rent from was because for the last year we've been having issues with finding a place to live because of our credit and when we saw this ad on craigslist saying she would work with us because of our credit issues we thought to ourselves, "we can't pass this up". We got in contact with this young lady, claiming her name was Jazz(Jasmine) Moon, we filled out application giving all our personal info, and within a day she called us to say, "Congratulations, you have been approved". She forwarded pics of the property and also the lease agreement, in which we signed and forwarded it back to her. In return she fed-ex the lease back with her signature and ways to ensure she could hold the property. We ended up sending money through moneygram to the property owner named Marie Johnson. Now this was all done within a couple of days, on monday we packed everything we owned, sold our unreliable car, withdrawn our kids from school, set up to have our jobs transferred and got on Greyhound and proceeded to come to Atl. where we thought we would finally have a nice home for our kids to lay. (that seemed much better than the cramped hotel we were currently in)

We we got here the next day, which was a tuesday we called Ms. Moon to say hey, we're here. She advised us to meet her so we could get our key, once to met things started to go down hill from there. She 1st claimed her copy of the key didn't work, bc the locks were changed, she then invited my tired, wornout family to her house, to wait to get in touch with property owner to get new keys. We waited in her home for over 5hours. And to make long story short, there was no such property to move into, nor any property owner name Marie Johnson. While in her home waiting we found out that this "Jazz Moon", real name was Janice Marie Johnson from mail she had laying around house, thats how she was able to pick up our deposit from Moneygram. We have police involved helping to lock her up but in the meantime........WE ARE HOMELESS, WITH NO WHERE TO GO. I can't even get my son back into Kindergarten because i have no address to officially enroll him. I have 150.00 to my name because we spent over 2000.00 getting here. Me and my husband are trying to be strong for our kids but as the days go by we become more and more hopeless. This last 150.00 will only be enough for a few more days in a hotel, then what?? I have no idea. Most shelters will not accept us as a full family. If anyone has any helpful info please contact me lakeishamwilson2@hotmail.com 

I would even appreciate if someone could just keep us in their prayers. My kids are really taking this hard, they cry all day, everyday because they are confused and can't understand why this is happening to us.

I appreciate any helpful comments........

We are a Midwestern Family in dire need of Financial assistance. My 30 year old Son was murdered just over 1 year ago and Now we have learned that The City in which we live will be taking our property via Eminent Domain. We are a Christian Family and have beening PRAYING that GOD will touch the Heart of another to assist us in our dire financial struggles. Our finances are totally diminished. Anyone that wishes to assist may write to us directly. Thank you for your Love and Generousity.                                                                                                                                                       Robert & Dolores Rast                                                                                                                                                                   PlanetMusic@comcast.net