Economic times turn desperate for some metro Atlantans

Roger Anthony cried.

Facing eviction from a four-bedroom house in Henry County, it was all Anthony could do when he learned his plan to buy a used mobile home fell through, and then a full-time job prospect with a moving company disappeared as well.

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JESSICA MCGOWAN / jmcgowan@ajc.com

The Sellers family: (from left) Tamasha, 6, Brianna, 4, Cassandra, Quintez, 8, Robert and Robyn, 17 months. Cassandra Sellers says her work hours have been cut and she has turned to charity to help pay bills.

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JESSICA MCGOWAN / jmcgowan@ajc.com

Cassandra Sellers’ son Robert helps brother Quintez, 8, by putting mustard on a simple dinner of hot dogs and fries in their southwest Atlanta home.

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“I just want … to be able to have a good place to stay and to be able to have a full-time job,” Anthony said.

Things brightened a bit this week when he found a place to go, although he said “it’s not even worth living in” because of electrical problems and water system leaks.

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Anthony lost his $8-an-hour job at a car dealership late last summer. A job at a car lube business paid $8.50 an hour but lasted a week.

He said he’s applied at dozens of places since early September, but all he’s gotten is a two-day-a-week job at an auto auction business, netting him $156 after taxes.

His live-in girlfriend also recently lost her job at a warehouse.”I don’t know what else to do except pray,” Anthony said. “We’ll just stay at the house until they [deputies] show up. Why does this happen to people?”

Stories like Anthony’s are an extreme but growing part of some discouraging data.

The Georgia jobless rate has climbed from 4.5 percent to 7 percent in a year, as payrolls shed 61,300 jobs.

Those numbers seem likely to keep rising. The U.S. Labor Department on Thursday releases a fresh batch of weekly jobless claims and on Friday issues a report on the unemployment rate. Each increase puts more pressure on agencies that step in to help the people hardest hit — those who were already on the edge when the economy soured. Many had low-paying jobs, lacked skills or education to get ahead or were financially overextended.

“It’s not uncommon for us to get 90 calls a day,” said Nola Love, president of His Name Ministries in Stockbridge, which has helped Anthony. Many are from “families that have never had to ask for help,” she said.

She said the charity assisted 7,800 families this year through October, up from about 4,000 in all of 2007.

In Georgia, roughly 343,000 people are looking for work, according to the state Labor Department. Nationwide the number in October was more than 10 million, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

At the same time, the working poor also are asking for help with overdue rent payments and utility bills. Some face eviction by landlords in financial trouble.

“We are getting people evicted because the landlord is in foreclosure and they have seven days to get out. It’s a new thing for us that we aren’t used to,” said Dorothy Chandler of the Midtown Assistance Center.

The Atlanta office of the United Way says it has seen a 20 percent increase in “basic needs assistance,” such as help paying utility bills or avoiding eviction.

“All across the board, we are seeing families caught up in very difficult situations,” said Milton Little, president of United Way of Metropolitan Atlanta. “The number of working people calling is staggering. Demand has increased significantly as unemployment has risen and the economy has slammed those already barely getting by.”

Cassandra Sellers was referred to the Buckhead Christian Ministry because she was so far behind paying for utilities.

Her estranged husband cannot financially help support their four young children because he was just laid off from his warehouse, though he does provide child care, she said. Sellers, who lives in southwest Atlanta, is trying to support her family by selling glasses and contact lenses at a struggling Newnan shopping center. She earns $8 an hour plus a 2 percent commission on some extras she sells.

She said her paycheck has dropped because of cuts in working hours — making her one of 6.7 million U.S. workers who work fewer hours than they want.

In a “good week” she will work 40 hours but mostly she is “getting 20-something hours. Maybe 30.”

Her first priority is to pay her bills for electricity and her Internet connection, which she uses to take online college courses.

But by mid-November, she had turned to charity for help. She was three months behind on her Georgia Power bill, and she owed SCANA Energy almost $90, half of that past due.

“It’s a struggle every day,” she said. “I’m currently looking for other employment even though I like what I do. But it’s not enough. It doesn’t pay the bills… .And my husband is looking for a job. Everywhere. But there’s no work no where.”

Kendall Cook, a 44-year-old out-of-work pipe fitter, isn’t in danger of losing his house in McDonough because it belonged to his grandmother.

But he has little else.

His well is dry. He and his wife bathe at the homes of relatives and fetch water in recycled milk jugs.

His mother-in-law and aunt help out with power bills and gas for the truck when they can.

The only heat in the house is from a wood-burning stove.

“I ain’t never asked them for nothing else,” Cook said.

He hasn’t worked full-time since the first of the year, when a Butts County sewage treatment project ended. His wife also has not worked in almost a year.

“I feel kind of worthless. I know there’s nothing I can do about it but I feel that way. But that’s just the way it is.”

He said he’s applied for jobs “everywhere in Henry County, with six temp places and stuff like that. I’ve called several places but they’re not hiring.”

He has submitted an application to wash dishes at a not-yet-opened restaurant. “I ain’t too proud to do nothing,” Cook said. “Its not very easy.”

“But today’s been a good day,” he said.

A family down the road offered him wood they had cut for their fireplace. They were leaving because the mortgage company had taken their house.

“I got free wood,” he said. “At least I’ll stay warm.”