Thread: FIRES LEAVE POOR FAMILIES (ILLEGAL ALIENS) WITH ASHES

Fires leaves poor families with ashes

By: TERI FIGUEROA - Staff Writer

People who had little struggle to make do with even less in aftermath

FALLBROOK -- They lived in a large aluminum shed. It was far too hot in the summer, and far too cold in the winter, but it was home.

They had a TV set, a refrigerator, even running water. No interior walls, really, but it was home.

Until the Rice fire swept through last month, the couple's shed in the middle of an avocado grove was home.

What little possessions Miguel and Sara Chavez had earned were lost to the flames.

They are not alone. Dozens of poor families in the avocado groves of Fallbrook, and in the far reaches of Pauma Valley, saw their homes melt into the earth -- part of the very land they till.

Some are part of a quiet population that makes its home under tenuous circumstances, laboring in the groves, building new homes, or scrubbing bathtubs and kitchen floors in North County.

And for many of them, there will be no insurance check in the mail, Konane Martinez, a researcher with the Cal State San Marcos-based National Latino Research Center, said last week.

Martinez says she knows of at least 25 families on the Rincon Reservation who lost everything in the fires but who do not qualify for federal assistance because they are in the country illegally.

"They are falling through the cracks big time," Martinez said. "And thousands more have been impacted by loss of work, and are not going to be able to make rent or make ends meet."

The center, which is part of the Farmworker Care Coalition, is organizing some of the relief efforts for fire victims.

According to numbers updated last week by county officials, the Rice fire, which burned through Fallbrook, took with it 240 homes -- many of them in the Valley Oaks mobile-home park near Pala Mesa.

The Poomacha fire, which raged in Pauma Valley, gutted 133 homes. And the Witch Creek fire destroyed 1,119 homes.

Martinez said the center has no idea yet how many poor families lost not just property but livelihood in the flames.

For the struggling, even those who are legal residents or citizens of the United States, the fire left behind nothing but heartbreak.

Among them is Miguel Chavez, who makes $64 a day running an 18-acre avocado grove in east Fallbrook.

The owner of the grove let him and his wife live in his large aluminum shed for free, and didn't charge them for water or electricity. So for five years, the Chavezes called home a 20-foot by 40-foot tin can that also housed farming equipment.

It is all ash now, gray bits covering the shed floor, a scatter broken only by the shell of a washing machine or by mattress coils.

'Nothing but no'

Mattress coils also poke up from the rubble that once was Kevin Peralta's bedroom in the Valley Oaks mobile-home park in eastern Fallbrook.

The 12-year-old pointed to the twisted metal. He stepped back. At his feet, it takes a second to figure it out, but there lays what was his bike. Wait, is that what it was? Yeah, yeah, he figured out after poking at it. That was his bike.

It's one of the items he misses the most.

As he talked, a sob rose behind him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw his mother's head buried in the chest of one of his older sisters.

Kevin whipped his head forward and pointed to more lost items. But his boyish smile melted, tears choked his words.

His mom, Irma Peralta, makes money for the family by cleaning homes.

Kevin Peralta's father feeds them by working in construction. If there is a Santa Claus, Kevin wants him to bring his dad a new pair of work boots.

The 12-year-old's first request, however, was for pencils, he sheepishly admitted. He wanted to be sure he had them for school.

It's stunning to see what a fire does to a trailer. Walls seem to disintegrate. Nothing remains of the Peralta home, save for the metal roof and the now-broken concrete braces on which the home sat. And, of course, the mattress coils and a charred bicycle frame.

The day before the flames, Kevin's father installed new tile in the bathroom.

The fire ripped through vegetation as it bore down on the mobile-home park. All Peralta had time to grab were a few family photos. Her son's video game system. Her daughter's computer. Blankets and pillows. Not much more.

Less than a week later, the family was surprised to learn that their trailer was not insured. And to also learn that they do not qualify for rental assistance. And the Federal Emergency Management Agency can't really help them, either.

Irma Peralta stood in the ashes Friday, as she has most days since the flames took her home a month ago. She cried. Again.

"My mom is just stuck. She has nothing," 23-year-old Lorena Castellanos said, stepping away from her teary mother. "At first there was hope. But now, she just keeps getting negatives."

The family has to come up with $4,000 to cover the cost of cleaning up the mess that was their home.

Peralta's two school-age kids sleep on mattresses on the floor of the place the family now rents in Fallbrook. They don't have winter clothes.

"She feels so drained," Castellanos said of her mother, who speaks only Spanish. "Everything she does now evolves around the fire."

At the shelter during the fires, the family was "promised a lot of help," Castellanos said. "At the end, there is nothing but a lot of 'no.' "

One car is enough

Not far away, just above Pala Mesa in Fallbrook, Peralta's friend and fellow house cleaner, Sarah Chavez, said the Red Cross supplied her and husband, Miguel, with $765. It is the only assistance they have gotten.

Of that money, $500 went to pay for the first month's rent on a room in Fallbrook.

She spent the balance on replacing work apparel and shoes for her husband. For herself, well, friends donated some of their old clothes.

Last week, a man contracting with FEMA came to their shed, and poked and prodded the piles of ash.

Armed with a camera, he took a number of photos of the shell of their home and of the burned-out pickup sitting in front of it. Miguel Chavez had fled the flames on foot that first Monday of the fires. The truck had a flat.

The man with FEMA told the couple that there's probably not much that can be done about the truck. After all, they have another car.

Later, after the man left, Miguel climbed into the car to run an errand. Whirrrrr. Click. Whirrrrr. Click. Whirrrrr. Click.

Almost.

Whirrrrr. Click. Whirrrrr.

And finally, an engine roar.

That car has little life left. Better last. It's all they've got.

-- Contact staff writer Teri Figueroa at (760) 631-6624 or tfigueroa@nctimes.com.

How to help



Relief groups say cash donations are easiest to handle and will enable them to buy grocery and gas cards for farmworker families. To donate money, or gasoline and grocery store cards, send them to Community Housing Works, which has established a farmworker Fire Relief Fund.

Make checks payable to "Community Housing Works." Please indicate in the subject line, "famworker fire relief" and mail to:

Community Housing Works

Attention: Patti Hamic-Christensen

1820 S. Escondido Blvd., Suite 101, Escondido, CA 92025.

Send donated goods, such as food, water, diapers and clothing, to:

Interfaith Community Services in Escondido

Main Office -- North County Inland, 550-B W. Washington Ave., Escondido, CA 92025.

Call (760) 489-6380 for more information.

http://nctimes.com/articles/2007/11/22/ ... _21_07.txt

Maybe I am missing something here?

Are we being asked to take pity on Illegal immigrants and send more of our hard earned money that is left over after the government rapes us with taxes?

Wouldn't a better thing to do is get a handful of bus tickets and send these invaders back to Mexico?

Am I really supposed to feel pity for a man that comes into our country illegally and then lives in a tin shed for free for 5 years?

Where is the money he saved on rent, food, and medical care? Did he send it back to Mexico?

Waiter, You are right on the money, click the link and read all the comments on the article.
http://nctimes.com/articles/2007/11/22/ ... _21_07.txt

They should go back home. There are too many homeless Americans who need help and many are war veterans.

The owner of the grove let him and his wife live in his large aluminum shed for free, and didn't charge them for water or electricity. So for five years, the Chavezes called home a 20-foot by 40-foot tin can that also housed farming equipment.

They had running water but it doesn't mention bathroom facilities--bet there were none and that poses a severe public health threat to the community.

Do not let spacious plans for a new world divert your energies from saving what is left of the old.
Winston Churchill

You're right, MJ

wrote on Nov 21, 2007 11:40 PM:

Its sad for these people. Really sad. Maybe That Chavez's boss could pay him more than $8.00 an hour to run an 18 acre farm. Thats slave labor. So he let him live in an aluminum storage shed. Wow what a guy. He didn't charge him for eletricity, or water. Oh the humanity. Now what? Does he have another storage shed on his property to help the guy out? The simple answer is the poor guy should just go back to Mexico. It obviously didn't work out here in the U.S. Its too bad, but what else can he do?

I have seen the living conditions some of them live in. There are some that have out houses. They also have dirt floors and some door frames have blankets as doors. One place I saw had electricity and Directv. There were even icicle lights hanging down that were still up in August. That place looked alot better than some in the villages of Mexico.

I am so tired of hearing about poor illegal alien families who fall on hard times, whether due to natural disasters or whatever. The local papers and news stations constantly report all kinds of these stories, as if we are all heartless monsters for not donating more in charity or paying more in taxes to provide every illegal family with spacious housing, college scholarships for their kids, everything that hard working legal families break their backs to try to earn and can barely afford, all the while obeying the law, paying taxes and never using welfare, foodstamps or the ER for their medical care. Seems to me that these people can't be doing that bad if they can all afford to have 8 kids, cars with spinning rims, cable TV, computers and cell phones.

I say too bad .. Let the orchard owners help their poor ilegal friends after all they are the ones that were using then..