Help B. J. and Angela Avoid Homelessness

I have a really good friend whose name is B. J. I used to be roommates with him when I lived in Arizona. He has been taking care of another friend who has had a lot of medical issues for the last several years. Her name is Angela, and she hasn’t been able to work since 2016. The reason B. J. has been taking care of her is that she really doesn’t have any family that would help her.

They had an apartment, and everything was going well until last summer, when a neighbor below them began using drugs, to the point that it was affecting their health. They got apartment security and law enforcement involved, but the only thing they were able to do is tell my friends that, based on the smell, it was most likely that the people were doing meth. However, the smell in my friend’s apartment or even outside the neighbor’s door was not enough. Law enforcement told my friends that in order to do anything about it, they would have to see someone actively doing meth. Needless to say, people who are doing that sort of thing don’t typically open their door for the police, at least until they’ve got everything put away. My friends were referred to the county Drug Enforcement Bureau, but that office stated that they have a major backlog of cases, and it would take quite a while to get to this one.

As stated, it was affecting their health, so much so that Angela had to go to the ER not long after this all started. They told her she had congestive heart failure (at the age of 40!), as well as pneumonia. Several medical professionals told my friends that meth is toxic to the heart, and based on the conditions at the apartment, they should definitely not go back there. They tried to work with the apartment management to move to a different unit, but they were told they would be charged some hefty fees that they couldn’t afford, among other roadblocks management was putting in their path.

In the meantime, they had to live somewhere, so they rented another place through Airbnb while they tried to get things worked out with the apartment complex (which means they were paying for two places for what ended up being over six months). While all this was going on, B. J. was laid off from his job, and due to the economy, he has had a great deal of difficulty finding a new one. There have been some good leads lately, but until a new job comes around, they are down to where they are out of money to live.

Their primary physician wrote an extensive letter to the corporation that owns the apartment complex, explaining what the medical issues are and what needs to be done to resolve them. The response from the owners was that they would let my friends out of their lease without the usual fees and with a lesser timeframe than normal. So while that part of the situation is “resolved”, the fact is that they are at their lowest point financially and now have nowhere to go, and their current Airbnb rental takes them to around the end of this month. After that, they are looking at being homeless.

They desperately need a place to stay so they can get back on their feet. Shelters don’t work for multiple reasons, primarily because the shelters say they don’t have any ability to store Angela’s refrigerated meds (which is also a problem if they end up homeless). These people are both good eggs, and they don’t deserve what has happened to them. Any help that can be provided would be greatly appreciated.