My name is Monica. I work as a Guide at Hearst Castle, which had been closed for the last 24 months first because of the pandemic and now because of some emergency road repairs. It’s the best job I’ve ever had in my 62 years of life, has good benefits, a decent wage, and in this rural area, is a really good job.

The guides are still working, but at half the hours, which has made paying our monthly bills difficult. Think of robbing Peter and Maurice to pay Paul every month for 2 years. It’s been so difficult that I took a part-time second job (minimum wage at a cookie bakery for approx 20 hours per week)last year to help. Usually, I worked 6-7 days a week. However, my landlady has raised my rent by 8-10% each year since 2019, the price of everything else just keeps going up, especially in the last 2 months, and the county where I live has just been named the most expensive county to live in the United States. And the bakery cut our hours in Feb because it’s their slow season. So I’m working 7 hours instead of 20.

The Castle is set to re-open on May 11, but the state is moving us from bi-monthly to monthly paychecks on July 1, and since we’re hourly workers, we have to work before we get paid, which means no paychecks at all between May 31 and July 1.

So I’m looking for help covering the 50% of the rent I still owe for April, 50% for May, and all of June’s.

Asking for help is hard for me. But I’m asking anyway. Every little bit helps…