Senior citizen in Thousand Oaks being forced from her trailer park home of more than 3 decades
A 72-year-old woman is being forced to move out of her mobile home, where she has lived for more than three decades, and now to help keep her from living on the streets, the community is rallying around her.
Dee Jackson has called space 13 inside a trailer park in Thousand Oaks home for 35 years.
Jackson has always been a dog lover, saying she moved into her home of all these years with five of them. She even works part-time as a groomer to supplement her social security.
Despite the obstacles she's faced while looking for a new home, she's remained filled with optimism.
"There are so many things to be grateful for. I am healthy. I have many friends. I have people looking out for me. What more could you want really?"
In four months, though, Dee will need a new place to call home. The mobile home park where she lives was sold to a developer who plans to extend the apartments next door.
"They want to develop it, I understand. They want to make money, like we all do," she told CBSLA.
One by one, Dee's neighbors have relocated over the past year, while the property was up for sale. She is now the last inhabitant of the mobile home park. Her modest trailer sits alone, dwarfed by the apartments and surrounded by dusty, empty lots and construction vehicles.
Dee's rent is only $600 a month. Even low-income housing nearby is more than twice that.
"...and I just put myself on a list, and one of the lists I am 89th. Everyone needs and wants low-income housing," she said.
The developer has offered Dee a hefty settlement to move, and she said he has given her more time to find a new place. One of her clients also started a fundraising page to help raise money for Dee's relocation. Part of the problem, though, is that her trailer is 60 years old and too old to move.
"We have got to find a place. Otherwise, I have my car. Can you imagine me with two dogs in my car, and my parrot?"
Dee told CBSLA that she's able to stay optimistic by looking at the positives in her life.
"...things could be a lot worse. Look at the people in the Ukraine, I mean. That's terrible. I am safe. I am living in the greatest country in the world."
Experts say that every year California loses thousands of mobile home spots as developers buy up the properties to make way for more expensive housing and living in a mobile home is some of the most affordable housing available in California.
